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OLIVER CROMWELL 



OLIVER CROMWELL 



HEROES OF ALL TIME 



FIRST VOLUMES 



Alexander the Great. By Ada Russell, M.A. 

(Vict.) 
Alfred the Great. By A. E. McKilliam, M.A. 
Augustus. By Rene Francis, B.A. 

Jeanne d'Arc. By E. M. Wilmot-Buxton, 

F.R.Hist.S. 
Mohammed. By Edith Holland. 
Oliver Cromwell. By Estelle Ross. 
Robert Louis Stevenson. By Amy Cruse. 
Sir Walter Raleigh. By Beatrice Marshall. 
William the Silent. By A. M. Miall. 



Other volumes in active preparation 



OLIVER 
CROMWELL 



BY 

ESTELLE ROSS 



With Frontispiece in Color and Eight 
Black-and-White Illustrations 




NEW YORK 

FREDERICK A. STOKES COMPANY 

PUBLISHERS 



< 



Copyright, igis, by 
Frederick A. Stokes Company 



All Rights Reserved 



SEE ~3 1915 

©CI.A4 10315 
K..« / 



Contents 



CHAPTER « PAGE 

T. The Boy 9 

II. The Period 17 

III. The Problem of the Age 21 

IV. Preparation 27 

V. Cromwell enters Public Life 36 

VI. Quiet Years 43 

VII. King Charles sows the Wind ..... 49 

VIII. The Long Parliament 58 

IX. Civil War 65 

X. The Triumph of the Ironsides 73 

XL Naseby 85 

XII. Parliament and the Army 93 

XIII. The Fate of Charles Stuart 103 

XIV. The Commonwealth 114 

XV. Cromwell in Scotland 129 

XVI. New Foes arise 146 

XVII. Praise God Barebones 158 

XVIII. Healing and Settling 166 

XIX. Will he be King? 175 

XX. Foreign Policy .182 

XXI. Death of Cromwell 187 

XXII. Epilogue 191 



Illustrations 

Oliver Cromwell Frontispiece 

PAGE 

The christening 10 

He was sent in custody to London 44 

For two days he was torn by indecision, and then signed 60 

Prince Rupert at Edgehill 70 

"My masters, he is come, he is come" 110' 

Cromwell rides through London 150 

John Milton 164 

Cromwell reading to his family 180 



CHAPTER I: The Boy 

IN the closing year of the sixteenth century, 
in the quiet little town of Huntingdon, 
Oliver Cromwell first saw the light. He 
was born on April 25, 1599, and baptized at 
St John's Church on the 29th of the same month 
and entered in the parish register as "son of 
Robert Cromwell, gentleman, and of Elizabeth 
Cromwell, his wife." 1 

Who were Robert and Elizabeth Cromwell? 
Many years afterward this son, speaking to one 
of his Parliaments, described his social position 
in the words, "I was by birth a gentleman, 
living neither in any considerable height nor 
yet in obscurity." 

Oliver had no reason to be ashamed of his 
ancestry on either side. His great-grandfather 
— Richard Williams by name — was a Welsh- 
man, and here we have the Celtic strain that 
fired Cromwell's more sluggish English blood. 
Richard Williams was nephew of Thomas Crom- 
well, Wolsey's friend and Henry VIII's minis- 
ter, known as 'the Hammer of the Monks.' 
Uncle Thomas liked and advanced his kinsman, 
and Richard Williams — partly in gratitude, no 
doubt, partly to insist on the relationship — 

1 The church no longer stands — it was pulled down a 
hundred and fifty years ago. 



Oliver Cromwell 

changed his surname to Cromwell. Thomas 
Cromwell was, as we know, like Wolsey to 
sound "all the depths and shoals of honour," 
like Wolsey to learn the wretchedness of the 
man who hangs on princes' favours. He it was 
who, for political purposes, negotiated Henry 
VIII's marriage with Anne of Cleves. But the 
lady had been flattered in her picture, and the 
King, who had expected a Venus, ungallantly 
dubbed her a "Flemish mare." He had a 
short way with wives and a short way with 
ministers: Anne, his fourth wife, was divorced 
and Thomas Cromwell paid "a long farewell to 
all his greatness" on the scaffold. 

Richard Cromwell, who was knighted at the 
tournament held in honour of the ill-starred 
wedding, where his prowess attracted the atten- 
tion of the royal bridegroom, did not share in 
his kinsman's disgrace. He appeared at Court 
clad in black, though the monarch's dislike of 
mourning was notorious. His boldness was for- 
given and he enjoyed the sunshine of princely 
favour to the end of his days. He had had his 
share of the spoil of the monasteries, for the 
Benedictine convent of Hinchinbrook and the 
rich Benedictine abbey of Ramsey, with their 
revenues and manors, had fallen to his lot. 

It was a goodly heritage for his eldest son, 
Henry, who carried the fortunes of the Cromwell 

10 



I 



?£.■; 



% 




THE CHRISTENING 



The Boy 

family a step farther, building himself a fine 
house at Hinchinbrook, where he might enter- 
tain with lavish splendour. Great were the 
preparations for Queen Elizabeth's visit when 
she was his guest on one of her royal progresses. 
The Queen dubbed him her knight, and such 
was his generosity and public spirit that he was 
known as 'the Golden Knight' to his friends 
and neighbours. When the Spanish Armada 
threatened England he trained twenty-six horse- 
men at his own expense for the defence of the 
land against "the devilish superstition of the 
Pope," as he put it. 

In the course of time, when Henry was 
gathered to his fathers, his eldest son, Oliver, 
inherited Hinchinbrook, and his second son, 
Robert, an estate in Huntingdon. His daugh- 
ters married well — one by her union with 
William Hampden became the mother of the 
patriot, John Hampden. Robert found his 
mate in Elizabeth Lynn, a young widow, the 
daughter of William Steward of Ely. The 
Stewards were people of good social standing, 
though there is no foundation for the legend 
that they could trace their descent from the 
Stuart kings of Scotland. They belonged to 
the landed gentry and farmed the cathedral 
tithes of Ely. Their ancestor, the last Prior of 
Ely, changed his views in the nick of time when 

ii 



Oliver Cromwell 

the dissolution of the monasteries was making 
Roman Catholic prelates quake in their shoes, 
and he remained in office as the first Protestant 
dean of Ely. 

Robert and Elizabeth Cromwell lived in 
Huntingdon. They were comfortably off, for 
their joint income of £360 a year would be worth 
something like £1200 nowadays. Four children 
had been born to them before their second son, 
Oliver, came on the scene. 

In later years many legends clustered round 
the childhood and boyhood of Oliver. They 
must not be taken too seriously, since the 
earliest biographers saw his character through 
the veil of their own prejudices. Until our own 
century justice has not been done to him. A 
Royalist writer records that "he was of a cross 
and peevish disposition," but this opinion was 
balanced by a more favourable observer, who 
declared that he had "a quick and lively ap- 
prehension, a piercing and sagacious wit, and a 
solid judgment." The truth lies between the 
two extremes. Throughout his life he was 
quick-tempered; as a boy he was certainly 
high-spirited, and probably he was occasion- 
ally troublesome also. His parents had their 
hands too full with the cares of their nine chil- 
dren to pay undue attention to this son, who 
was followed by three sisters and a brother. 

12 



The Boy 

Gaps soon came in the family. Oliver was 
but a baby when his eldest sister, a little 
girl of eight, died; he was old enough to realize 
the shadow of death when his eldest brother 
died, and when his youngest brother survived 
his birth by only a few months. 

It is related of Oliver that, in his infancy, he 
was taken to his uncle's house and laid in a 
cradle, whereupon a monkey seized him and 
carried him up to the roof. The agonized 
household held mattresses below him lest he 
should be dropped by his captor. Fortunately 
when the monkey had had enough of his infant 
charge he brought him down in safety. 

Another legend records that at the same 
house of Hinchinbrook he first encountered the 
prince with whom he was to come to a death- 
grapple in later years. Prince Charles, journey- 
ing from Scotland to England, was the guest 
of Sir Oliver Cromwell, and little Oliver, who 
was invited to meet him, so forgot what was due 
to Royalty that he fell to fighting him. Prince 
Charles, who was a fragile child, had much the 
worst of it, and retired from the struggle with 
a bleeding nose. 

Other stories of Oliver's boyhood are not so 
hard to believe. He was, no doubt, like many 
another lad, an 'apple dragon,' and may have 
been given to pigeon-stealing. The discipline 

13 



Oliver Cromwell 

of schooldays would have quelled his childish 
spirits. He was sent to the free school at 
Huntingdon, where Dr Thomas Beard, a stern 
Puritan, believed that sinners are not only 
punished in the world to come, but that retri- 
bution dogs their footsteps in this world also. 
He had written a book entitled The Theatre 
of God's Judgments Displayed, to convince hu- 
manity at large of this fact, and he proved it 
to his scholars by a liberal use of the rod. 

It was said that once the schoolboys acted a 
play called The Five Senses. Oliver, wreathed 
with laurel, was making for the stage when 
he stumbled against a property crown. He 
straightway discarded his own headgear, 
crowned himself, and made a fine speech to 
his schoolfellows. 

At seventeen he left school, and was entered 
at Sidney Sussex College, Cambridge, on April 
23, 1616. On the same day a great career was 
closed at Stratford-on-Avon, for Shakespeare's 
worldly course was run. 

Oliver once more came under a strongly 
Puritan influence, for the head of the college 
was Dr Samuel Ward, a fine type of man, who 
had been one of the translators of the autho- 
rized version of the Bible. He was a con- 
vinced Puritan, and his college was called by 
Archbishop Laud a 'nursery' of Puritanism. 

14 



The Boy 

Oliver was essentially a man of action. In his 
college days he loved an outdoor life, horse and 
field exercise, football, cudgels, and boisterous 
games, rather than severe study. Nevertheless 
he profited by his academic course, becoming 
well read in ' Greek and Latin story,' and 
proficient in mathematics and cosmography — 
studies he greatly valued. Sir Walter Raleigh's 
History of the World was ever a favourite work 
with him, but he was never bookish. 

His college career was brought to an abrupt 
close when, in June 1617, his father died, and 
as he was the only surviving son and his father's 
heir, he returned home. Ultimately, no doubt, 
he was to take his sire's place as head of the 
family, but in the meantime his mother did not 
consider him fully equipped for his part in life. 
Little could she foresee what that part was to 
be! Her highest ambitions for her boy were 
that he should be an upright country gentleman 
carrying on the good old traditions of the 
Cromwell family, becoming eventually a Justice 
of the Peace and possibly a member of Parlia- 
ment. With these ideals in view she sent him 
to London to study law. Whether or not he 
entered one of the Inns of Court is not definitely 
known, and though tradition says that he was 
a student of Lincoln's Inn, there is no record 
of his name on the books. 

15 



Oliver Cromwell 

He was now free from parents and school- 
masters, and it was said that he made use of his 
liberty to sow his wild oats. A letter written 
many years afterward, when he was thirty-nine, 
to his cousin, Mrs St John, is quoted as evidence: 
"You know what my manner of life hath been. 
Oh, I have lived in and loved darkness, and 
hated light; I was a chief, the chief of sinners. 
This is true: I hated godliness, yet God had 
mercy on me." There is this to be said on the 
other side. Cromwell became such a deeply 
religious man that he judged his easy-going 
youth very harshly, and in all probability his 
tares grew but a scanty crop. 

In London Oliver made the acquaintance of 
the Bourchiers: Sir James, a wealthy merchant, 
his wife, and their daughter Elizabeth, a comely 
girl but a year older than he was. They had 
a fine town house on Tower Hill and a country 
home at Felstead in Essex. Oliver fell in love 
with Elizabeth, and her parents did not look 
unfavourably on his suit. He was betrothed 
to her, and when he was twenty-one they were 
married in the beautiful old church of St Giles, 
Cripplegate, where we can still read in the 
parish register the entry which records their 
union. 



16 



CHAPTER II : The Period 

BEFORE we follow the fortunes of the 
young bride and bridegroom, let us take 
a brief survey of a few of the important 
events that were making English history during 
Oliver Cromwell's childhood and youth. He 
was born when Queen Elizabeth, that last and 
most typical representative of the Tudor mon- 
archs, was on the throne. He must have heard 
many a description of her in his nursery days, 
of the splendour of her garments sewn with 
jewels, of her haughty bearing, of her vanity — in 
short, all the tittle-tattle about Royalty that is 
ever welcome gossip. He would have been told 
how jealous she had been of Mary Queen of 
Scots, and how, after keeping her for many years 
in captivity, she had condemned her to death. 
This had happened a dozen years before his 
birth, but it was still fresh in people's minds, 
especially as Elizabeth was now growing old 
and the heir to the throne was Mary's son, 
James VI of Scotland. When little Oliver was 
just beginning to prattle and to try the strength 
of his sturdy limbs the country was shocked 
by the news that the Queen, unforgiving to the 
last, had allowed her favourite Essex to be 
beheaded. But though the Cromwell house- 
hold, together with many another, would discuss 

17 



Oliver Cromwell 

the Earl's fate, the knowledge of it would 
not cause such a shock of horror as it would 
to-day. Indeed, such a punishment would be 
impossible in the twentieth century, but in 
those days the axe was a swift way of solving 
difficulties and paying off old scores. 

Probably the first public event which really 
gripped the child's mind was the passing of the 
great Queen when he was four years old. Her 
death ended an epoch, and in the new one which 
dawned when James I succeeded her on the 
throne the little boy plucking the early prim- 
roses in the fields around his home was destined 
to play a leading part. 

He was not only to hear of the customary 
rejoicings at the coronation, but he was actually 
to see the new monarch on his journey from 
Scotland to England. Sir Oliver, true to the 
splendid traditions of his house, received his 
royal guest at Hinchinbrook, and entertained 
him with such lavish hospitality that it exceeded 
that of any other of the King's hosts. Sir Oliver 
was made a Knight of the Bath, and James 
honoured his house by three subsequent visits. 

What did little Oliver think of the King? 
Children are not over-critical as to the personal 
appearance of grown-up people, but no doubt he 
had his dreams of what a sovereign should be 
and thought his childish thoughts when his blue 

18 



The Period 

eyes rested on James, "clad in green as the grass 
he trod on, with a feather in his cap, and a horn 
instead of a sword by his side." The King was 
not an imposing figure, of middle height, and 
rather stout, with "a rolling eye, a thin beard, 
tongue too large for his mouth, and weak, 
tottering legs." 

Grave political and religious difficulties — too 
grave for the child to understand — were to 
mark the new reign. We shall deal with them 
in another chapter. But one result of these 
troubles thrilled the boy of six, when the news 
spread like wildfire through England that the 
Roman Catholics had plotted to blow up the 
Houses of Parliament on November 5, 1605, 
when the King was to be present to open the 
session. At the eleventh hour a Catholic noble 
had been warned by one of the accomplices, 
and the game was up ! Guy Fawkes was caught 
in the cellar, waiting to fire the powder; the 
other conspirators fled, and one by one they 
were tracked to their hiding-places, to forfeit 
their lives on the scaffold. 

Other public events seemed tame after this 
crisis, especially the tittle-tattle of Court gossip. 
James I was infatuated by George Villiers, the 
handsome Duke of Buckingham. He called 
him 'Steenie' and entirely forgot his dignity as 
a king in the familiarity of their intercourse. 

19 



Oliver Cromwell 

Various scandals of Court life were the gossip 
of the ale-house and the servants. The court 
ladies got drunk, the unseemly behaviour of the 
courtiers made men of the older generation 
shake their heads and hark back to "the stately 
times of great Elizabeth." With all her faults, 
James's predecessor never forgot that she was 
a queen; he, however, considered that the 
"divine right' covered a multitude of indiscre- 
tions. 

School and college days were over and Oliver 
was beginning to take a personal interest in the 
affairs of the big world, reading law in London, 
when Sir Walter Raleigh, having failed to find 
the river of gold or to keep the peace with the 
Spaniards, perished on the scaffold. In all 
probability the young man was among the 
immense crowd of sightseers who on that chill 
October morning watched the passing of the 
great Elizabethan to his doom. 



20 



CHAPTER III: The Problem 
of the Age 

EACH age has its own problem to face, its 
own inheritance of the mistakes of the 
previous one. The seventeenth cen- 
tury was to see the birth of new ideals which 
threatened the very existence of monarchy. 
The country had acquiesced in the rule of the 
Tudors partly because they were dominant per- 
sonalities, partly because it required time to 
recover after the weary conflict of the Wars of 
the Roses. Then, too, nothing succeeds like 
success. In Elizabethan days England rose in 
glory and stood high in the estimation of Europe. 
National pride was quickened by the defeat of 
the Spanish Armada and by the voyages of the 
great seamen, Grenville, Raleigh, and Drake. 

The Tudors had the power to force their will 
on the people. At best such a rule was bad 
alike for governor and governed; at its worst 
it was tyranny. 

It was the misfortune of the Stuarts that they 
could not realize that the death of Elizabeth 
meant the end of absolute sovereignty, and 
for this lack of understanding the house was 
doomed. 

James I had no sooner ascended the throne of 

21 



Oliver Cromwell 

England (thus uniting the Crowns of England 
and Scotland) than he was made to feel that his 
new kingdom was in a state of transition and 
that the era of subservience was at an end. 
The points of view of King and Parliament were 
radically different. James, in The True Law 
of Free Monarchy, asserted his belief in the 
' divine right of kings' — the sovereign was 
above all human law and when he obeyed it he 
did so merely to set an example to his subjects. 
"As it is atheism and blasphemy to dispute 
what God can do, so it is presumption and high 
contempt in a subject to dispute what a king 
can do, or to say that a king cannot do this or 
that." 

The newly elected members of Parliament 
were no less emphatic as to their position, and in 
the 'Apology' which they presented to him 
the year after his accession they made it per- 
fectly clear. "Our privileges and liberties are 
our right and due inheritance, no les3 than our 
very lands and goods. . . . They cannot be 
withheld from us, denied or impaired, but with 
apparent wrong to the whole state of the realm." 

In brief the contest was to be this: Had the 
King sovereign power independently of Parlia- 
ment or only through Parliament? Was the 
monarch, in common with his people, subject to 
the law, or was the law subject to the King? 

22 



The Problem of the Age 

James was not the man to hold the reins of 
government at such a time. Though not 
without intelligence — he has been called "the 
wisest fool in Christendom" — he was a dull 
pedant, and had none of that tact which would 
have helped him to steer a safe course. 

But England had not to face the political 
problem only; there was the religious difficulty 
as well. 

The Reformation had not produced a nation 
of one mind as to religious observance, though 
people of that age, lacking the wider vision of 
our own, still believed that uniformity was 
possible. There were four main divisions: the 
Arminians or Anglicans, the Puritans, the 
Presbyterians, and the Roman Catholics. The 
first two in some way corresponded to the High 
and Low Church of to-day, for both were within 
the pale of the Church of England. Like the 
Roman Catholics, the Arminians believed in the 
authority and traditions of the Church. For 
them the Reformation did not introduce any 
new form of worship, but simply swept away 
abuses that had gathered round the old. They 
retained most of the beautiful liturgy and the 
symbols of the faith, though they staunchly 
denied the supremacy of the Pope. 

The Puritans, on the other hand, though for 
the most part they still remained within the 

23 



Oliver Cromwell 

Church of England, thought that the Reforma- 
tion had not gone far enough. The old tradi- 
tions were hateful to them. They desired a 
purer form of worship founded solely on the 
Bible. The Book should be diligently studied, 
not only in order to "justify the ways of God 
to man," but in order that the creature might 
understand the will of the Creator. The cross 
in baptism, the ring in marriage, the cap and 
surplice and official robes, the very Prayer Book 
itself, were but superstitions. They wanted 
the pure Word of God. Unfortunately for 
such guidance through the mazes of this trouble- 
some world, the Bible is capable of many 
interpretations in accordance with the point of 
view of the reader, and the Puritans themselves 
were to split into many different sects. But, 
for good and ill, they were fated to play an 
enormous part in shaping the destinies not only 
of England but of that "new world called 
America." Fanatics there were among them, 
without doubt, but the majority were people 
of sincere conviction, to whom life was a serious 
business, not alone here and now, but as the 
preparation for a world to come. 

The Presbyterians desired an entirely re- 
modelled Church with another form of govern- 
ment. Bishops and priests were abhorrent to 
them, and presbyters and elders were to take 

24 



The Problem of the Age 

their place. The discipline was strict, and 
offending members could be called before a 
Presbytery for any offence in life or doctrine, 
to listen meekly to grave rebuke or the sentence 
of expulsion from the Church. The Presbytery, 
too, claimed the power of declaring the mind of 
God "in all questions of religion." 

The Roman Catholics were the adherents of 
the faith that had grown up from earliest times 
through the Middle Ages, which they held 
unchanged and unchangeable. Their supreme 
earthly head was the Pope, who was infallible 
in his judgments. They revered and worshipped 
the Virgin as they did her Son, and they held 
that the bread and wine used in the service of 
the Mass were in some mystical way changed 
into the body and blood of Christ. 

All parties looked to James I to do something 
for them. The hopes of the Presbyterians ran 
high, for he had been bred among them. This, 
however, was little recommendation to him, 
for he had grown heartily tired of their long 
dissertations and admonitions. The Roman 
Catholics looked to the son of Mary Stuart to 
allow them a larger measure of toleration; 
ultimately they hoped that Roman Catholicism 
would once more become the State religion — 
but the time was not yet ripe for it. James 
had promised them a certain amount of freedom, 

25 



Oliver Cromwell 

but no sooner had he ascended the throne than 
the laws against them were so rigorously en- 
forced that the extremists formed the Gun- 
powder Plot. Its discovery led to far harsher 
laws against the Roman Catholics, and thence- 
forth they were obliged to receive the Mass 
in secret as though they were committing a 
crime. 

The Puritans also hoped for many things 
from the new reign, as did the Arminians. The 
latter came off the better. 'No Bishop, no 
King,' came to be the motto of the House of 
Stuart. It was a case of mutual service: if 
the bishops preached the 'divine right,' the 
kings could not but support them. 

The political and religious troubles were to 
lead to civil war, to the death of Charles I, to 
the Commonwealth, and to the Restoration. 



26 



CHAPTER IV: Preparation 

TO the old house at Huntingdon where he 
had been born and bred, Oliver now 
returned with his bride. His mother 
and his unmarried sisters still remained in 
residence, for two generations of an English 
family in the seventeenth century (like the 
French families in the nineteenth) often lived 
under one roof. If the young wife sighed at 
times for a home of her very own, she doubtless 
sighed in secret. Her husband and his mother 
were devoted to one another and it would have 
ill become her to have sown discord between 
them. And, besides, old Mistress Cromwell 
would not have been easy to tackle. To judge 
her character from her portrait, she was a 
woman of marked individuality, keen and firm, 
with a touch of shrewdness and humour. Her 
penetrating eyes probably noticed shortcomings 
in the town-bred daughter-in-law. Elizabeth 
at times yearned, no doubt, for her father's fine 
house on Tower Hill and the gay doings and the 
gossip of the great city. But since she was of an 
amiable and pleasant disposition she must soon 
have learned to adapt herself to her new posi- 
tion, to stifle an occasional yawn, to cease to 
compare Huntingdon unfavourably with the 
Metropolis, and to settle down. 

27 



Oliver Cromwell 

Fortunately women had little time for moping 
in those days, for, though the households were 
less self-sufficing than in the Middle Ages, still 
much was done at home that is now consigned 
to factory and workshop. A notable housewife 
would superintend baking, brewing, and dairy- 
work; her store-room and still-room would be 
objects of pride; her linen-cupboard would 
become a legend to future generations; her 
stitchery and her embroidery would be handed 
down as heirlooms. Cromwell's mother, how- 
ever, was of a practical bent, and the story that 
he was the son of a brewer came from the fact 
that she not only brewed excellent ale for 
household consumption, but when her store was 
overfull she allowed her neighbours to be her 
customers. 

The men-folk, too, were fully occupied, and 
Cromwell busied himself about his farm, plough- 
ing and sowing, reaping, rearing cattle and 
sheep, and going to the neighbouring towns 
on market-days to sell his stock. But he had 
leisure to attend to local affairs and we get 
glimpses of him later as a champion of the rights 
of the poorer folk. To all outward appearance 
he too was settling down to lead the life of 
an active country gentleman, following in his 
father's footsteps, as a respected member of an 
old family. 

28 



Preparation 

There was good reason that he should be 
active and industrious, for a little more than a 
year after his marriage his eldest child was 
born. He was christened Robert in St John's 
Church, Huntingdon, and some eighteen months 
later he had a baby brother, Oliver. 

The experience of fatherhood deepened Crom- 
well's character. In his solitary walks by the 
banks of the sluggish river Ouse, when the day's 
work was done, he would brood over the prob- 
lem of man's relation to his Maker. At times 
he fell into states of deep melancholy — such 
experiences are common with those who strive 
to solve for themselves the mysteries of life and 
death — and often at such times his anxious wife 
would send in haste for the doctor to prescribe 
for him. But there was little to be done for 
him, as his sickness was of the soul rather than 
of the body. Dr Simcox related that he was 
often sent for at midnight since Mr Cromwell 
was very 'splenetic' and thought that he was 
about to die. Cromwell also had fancies about 
the Town Cross. The Puritan influence of 
boyhood and manhood had sunk deep and he 
had little reverence and much distrust for such 
symbols of the faith. 

The time of inward storm came to an end, 
and Cromwell found an anchorage for his 
troubled soul in an inalienable belief and trust 

29 



Oliver Cromwell 

in God, and in His message to man as unfolded 
in the Bible. 

The sober life of the little Puritan household 
in Huntingdon was in strong contrast to the 
gay life of town. With them the Bible was the 
Book — the only one that mattered — and their 
language and forms of expression were founded 
on this magnificent model. In town 40,000 
play-books were printed in a couple of years 
and were "more vendible than the choicest 
sermons." The Puritans looked askance not 
only at plays, playwrights, and playgoers, but 
at the homely village fairs and dances, and the 
more fanatical of them forbade even the most 
harmless pleasures to the younger generation. 

Five years after Cromwell's marriage the 
bells of Huntingdon, in common with the bells 
of all the parish churches of England, tolled the 
death of James I. His eldest surviving son, 
Charles, ascended the throne. The new 
reign held great promise, for the young 
prince, who was Cromwell's junior by but a 
year, had much in his favour. He was a 
marked contrast to his father, of dignified 
bearing, handsome and courteous, and to out- 
ward appearance 'every inch a king.' Mrs 
Hutchinson, whose memoirs of her husband 
throw light on the life of the time, tells us: 
"The face of the Court was much changed in 

30 



Preparation 

the change of the King; for King Charles was 
temperate, chaste, and serious; so that the fools 
and bawds, mimics and catamites of the former 
Court grew out of fashion; and the nobility 
and courtiers, who did not quite abandon their 
debaucheries, had yet that reverence to the 
Bang to retire into corners to practise them: 
men of learning and ingenuity in all arts were 
in esteem, and received encouragement from 
the King, who was a most excellent judge and 
a great lover of paintings, carvings, gravings, 
and many other ingenuities." 

But the joy-bells had hardly ceased ringing 
for the coronation before troubles began. 
Charles, much to the satisfaction of the country, 
had failed to secure the Infanta of Spain as 
his bride. He had married instead Henrietta 
Maria, the fifteen-year-old daughter of Henry 
IV of France — a Roman Catholic to the core. 
The little Puritan household would have had 
special opportunities for hearing all the latest 
news, for Cromwell's uncle, Sir Oliver, repre- 
sented the county of Huntingdon in Parliament, 
and the fact that he had more than once enter- 
tained Royalty would have given him access to 
the Court circle. No doubt they were greatly 
perturbed at the thought of the Roman Catholic 
princess as Queen Consort of England — espe- 
cially as the King had promised as part of the 

3i 



Oliver Cromwell 

marriage agreement that the penal laws against 
the Catholics should not be enforced. Added 
to this, the young Queen not only brought over 
her own priests, but insisted that a chapel 
should be set apart for her worship. Charles, 
who always played a double game, was at a loss 
what to do: he did not want to irritate his 
Protestant subjects by unduly favouring the 
Roman Catholics, and yet he did not wish to 
break his promise to the King of France. Court 
gossip told of so much friction between the 
royal pair that they had decided to live apart. 
The Queen, no doubt, had in addition to other 
grievances, to complain of Charles's devotion to 
the Duke of Buckingham, who advised him in 
all matters. She was not alone in hating the 
Duke, for the country at large shared her 
distrust and made him the scapegoat of his 
master's earliest mistakes. The nation was 
only too willing to give the young King a chance 
if he would but get rid of his all-powerful 
favourite. 

Sir Oliver Cromwell sat in the first two 
Parliaments of the reign — neither of them was a 
good augury of what was to come. The King 
wanted money not only for his personal ex- 
penses, but also to prosecute a war with Spain; 
Parliament wanted an assurance that the Pro- 
testant faith should be tampered with in no 

32 



Preparation 

wise. The first Parliament was dismissed by 
the King in three months; the second, sum- 
moned six months later, was in an even less 
conciliatory mood. Charles wanted money to 
pay for the fleet at Plymouth, and to keep up 
the army and navy; Parliament wanted redress 
of grievances. Sir John Eliot, who was to play 
a notable part in the coming struggle, voiced 
the discontent of the country: "Our honour 
is ruined, our ships are sunk, our men perished, 
not by the enemy, not by chance but ... by 
those we trust." 

Who was to blame? The Duke of Bucking- 
ham. 

"He has broken those nerves and sinews of 
our land, the stores and treasures of the King. 
There needs no search for it. It is too visible. 
His profuse expenses, his superfluous feasts, his 
magnificent buildings, his riots, his excesses, 
what are they but the visible evidences of an 
express exhausting of the State, a chronicle of 
the immensity of his waste of the revenues of 
the Crown?" 

As a result of his outspokenness Eliot found 
himself in the Tower, but the attitude of Par- 
liament was so menacing that he was soon set 
at liberty. The impeachment of Buckingham 
passed the House of Commons and the case 
was duly taken to the Lords. The Duke, richly 

33 



Oliver Cromwell 

clad and adorned with jewels, appeared in 
person and the insolence of his bearing was 
noted by all. He put his trust in princes and 
his royal master stood by him. The King 
refused to dismiss him and hastily dissolved 
Parliament. 

This, satisfactory as it was to Buckingham, 
left Charles in greater financial difficulties than 
ever. His first experiment of requesting free 
gifts from his subjects was a disastrous failure, 
his second of demanding a forced loan had little 
better fortune. Among those who refused to 
pay we note the name of Oliver's cousin, the 
dauntless John Hampden, a young Buckingham- 
shire squire. "I could be content to lend but 
fear to draw upon myself the curse in Magna 
Charta, which should be read twice a year 
against those who infringe it." He was duly 
imprisoned for his fearlessness and such was the 
rigour of the treatment that though he lived to 
strike again he was never the same man. 

Buckingham, whose position was far from 
secure, hoped to dazzle the country by success 
in arms, and with this in view he bethought 
himself of the besieged Protestants in Rochelle, 
and persuaded his master to place him at the 
head of an expedition of 10,000 men to go to 
their relief. The total and hopeless failure of 
this undertaking only complicated the King's 

34 



Preparation 

difficulties, and he was forced once more to 
summon a Parliament. 

While all these momentous happenings were 
going on in the country at large the Cromwells 
had their share of the ups and downs of life in 
quiet Huntingdonshire. Sir Oliver was in great 
difficulties: he had lived far beyond his income 
and was obliged to sell the old family mansion 
at Hinchinbrook. He removed to Ramsey 
Mere, where he lived in diminished state on 
the remnants of his substance, retired from 
public life. 

To outward eyes the fortunes of the family 
were at the ebb when Oliver Cromwell sought 
the suffrages of the townsfolk of Huntingdon 
and was duly elected to represent them in the 
third Parliament of the reign of Charles I. 



35 



CHAPTER V: Cromwell enters 
Public Life 

CROMWELL bade farewell to his wife 
and children and rode off to London. 
Though the journey was only some sixty 
miles it was something of an undertaking since 
roads were often bad. It was no uncommon 
thing for a coach to stick fast in the mire and for 
travellers to bear with what patience they 
might long hours of delay before it could be 
extricated. 

Once in town Cromwell's eye must have noted 
the changes that had taken place since his last 
visit, and he would probably have set about 
securing a lodging somewhere in the neighbour- 
hood of Westminster. No doubt his cousin, 
John Hampden, who though but five years his 
senior was now an old Parliamentary hand, 
counselled and advised him. 

It was no new scene for Cromwell. He must 
often have walked to the Abbey in his law- 
student days, and perhaps attended the Church 
of St Margaret nestling in its shadow — just as 
it stands to-day. 

His glance would have rested with quickened 
interest on the beautiful Gothic building that 
then housed the Commons. In pre-Reformation 

36 



Cromwell enters Public Life 

days it had been a chapel, the lower chamber 
dedicated to St Mary of the Vaults, the upper, 
where the House sat, to St Stephen. The 
House of Lords had their meeting-place in the 
adjoining ancient Court of Requests. These 
buildings were used by England's legislators 
until the disastrous fire of 1834 burnt them to 
the ground. But Westminster Hall still stands 
as it stood in Richard II's day. 

What were Cromwell's thoughts as he took 
his seat for the first time in the House, as a 
chosen representative of the people? It was a 
moment, in spite of future glories and triumphs, 
never to be forgotten. His keen eye noted the 
Speaker's chair with its rich gilding, the table 
for the Clerks of the House, the green-covered 
seats for the members rising in tiers on either 
side, with the galleries for strangers up above. 
This was but the body of the House — its soul 
was in the men who sat there. What giants 
there were in those days! Sir John Eliot, the 
noble patriot; Pym, the keen Parliamentary 
leader; Chief Justice Coke, deeply versed in 
law; Wentworth, now on the side of the Par- 
liament, later as the Earl of Strafford to become 
the King's most trusted adviser. 

How did the new representative for Hunting- 
don strike his fellow-members? He was a plain 
countryman, lacking many of the charms of 

37 



Oliver Cromwell 

manner and person that graced the courtly 
gentlemen of town. 

Parliament met on March 17, 1628, once more 
to grapple with the old problem — how to make 
the grant of supplies to the King dependent on 
the redress of grievances. Eliot spoke in no 
measured tones of the country's danger: 

"Upon this dispute not only our goods and 
land are engaged, but all that we call ours. 
Those rights, those privileges that made our 
fathers freemen are in question. If they be 
not now the more carefully preserved, they 
will render us to our posterity less free, less 
worthy than our fathers." Wentworth was 
fired by the same spirit when he declared: 
"We must vindicate our ancient liberties, we 
must reinforce the laws made by our ancestors. 
We must set such a stamp upon them as no 
licentious spirit shall dare hereafter to invade 
them." 

With this purpose in view the House drew 
up the Petition of Right, in which was clearly 
set forth the right of Parliament to control 
taxation: "No man hereafter," it declared, 
"is to be compelled to make or yield any gift, 
loan, benevolence, tax, or such-like charge, with- 
out common consent by Act of Parliament." 
This was a direct blow at the King's prerogative, 
and he hesitated to sign it. It was only when 

38 



Cromwell enters Public Life 

confronted with the fear that Buckingham's 
name as "the author and source of all these 
miseries" would be inserted in the Remon- 
strance that Parliament was drawing upon the 
state of the realm that he gave way. 

And what of Buckingham? Anxious that he 
should retrieve his position by success in arms, 
the King put him once more at the head of an 
expedition to go to the relief of Rochelle. He 
was at Portsmouth, waiting to embark, when a 
man from among the crowd that pressed round 
him — a stern-faced young Puritan lieutenant — 
swiftly drew out a hunting-knife and stabbed 
him to the heart. A few hours later the tidings 
reached the King. He threw himself upon his 
bed in an agony of grief which was intensified by 
the knowledge that, outside the palace, shouts 
of exultation greeted the deed. Crowds lined 
the streets and praised and blessed the murderer 
as he passed on his way to his doom. Cromwell 
was not among the motley mob of townsfolk 
and apprentices, for Parliament was not then 
sitting and he had returned home. The popu- 
lace that had lit their bonfires and rung their 
bells with glee at the passing of the Petition of 
Right, now rejoiced that the King's evil counsel- 
lor was for ever removed from his side. Surely 
now all would be well with the country! 

But from this time forward another counsellor, 
39 



Oliver Cromwell 

no less self-seeking, was to have a baneful 
influence on the King — his consort, Queen 
Henrietta Maria. She was, as we have already 
said, a true daughter of the Roman Catholic 
Church and zealous for her faith. Men and 
women grew to fear that the Protestant religion 
would be undermined by Popish practices, for 
Charles I was a High Churchman both by con- 
viction and by temperament. The forms and 
ceremonies of worship were all-important to 
him, and the symbolic beauty of the services 
and the liturgy had a special appeal. Charles 
promoted to the highest office the clergy who 
held similar views to his own, and they used 
their position to harass the Puritan preachers. 

It was determined to thrash the matter out 
in Parliament, and when the members met 
again after the recess Eliot sounded the trumpet- 
call: "The Gospel is that truth in which the 
country has been happy through long and rare 
prosperity. This ground therefore let us lay for 
a foundation of our building, that that Truth, 
not with words but with actions, we will main- 
tain." 

It was in this connexion that Cromwell made 
his maiden speech in the House. A certain 
Dr Alabaster had been preaching 'flat Popery' 
at St Paul's Cross, and Dr Beard, Cromwell's 
old schoolmaster, had been informed by his 

40 



Cromwell enters Public Life 

bishop, Dr Neile, that such doctrine was to be 
accepted. The stern old pedagogue paid no 
heed to this admonition, boldly preached against 
Dr Alabaster, and was reprimanded — so the 
member for Huntingdon informed the House. 
There is still extant the first mention of Crom- 
well's name in Parliamentary annals: 

"Upon question, Ordered That Dr Beard of 
Huntingdon be written to by Mr Speaker, to 
come up and testify against the Bishop; the 
order for Dr Beard to be delivered to Mr 
Cromwell." 

The King now played his trump card — he 
determined to dissolve Parliament. A fort- 
night later Speaker Finch informed the House 
that he had an order to adjourn. One or two 
of the younger members rushed at him, seized 
him, and held him down in the chair; the doors 
were locked, and none heeded the knocking of 
the King's usher without. "Let him go! Let 
him go! Let Mr Speaker go!" 

"No, God's wounds!" they replied, "he shall 
sit there till it pleases the House to rise." 

In this scene of uproar Eliot managed to put 
three resolutions: for the preservation of the 
Protestant faith, for Parliamentary control of 
taxation, and a ban on any who willingly paid 
taxes other than those levied by Parliament. 
The resolutions were passed with acclamation 

41 



Oliver Cromwell 

and among the shouts of assent Cromwell's 
"Aye! Aye!" rang clear. 

Never again was the House to echo to the 
eloquence of Eliot. Charles, in his deep indigna- 
tion at the defiance shown that day, sent him 
to the Tower, and before another Parliament 
was summoned he was dead. 



42 






CHAPTER VI: Quiet Years 

^MID such stirring scenes Cromwell's 
/—% apprenticeship to politics was served. 
JL JL. The eleven years to follow, during 
which Charles ruled without a Parliament, were 
years of preparation for that future in which 
he was to be the man of destiny. 

He returned to Huntingdon, where there was 
now a little brood of children to welcome him, 
for Robert and Oliver had been followed as the 
years went on by Bridget, Richard, Henry, and 
Elizabeth, the baby at the time. His wife had 
her hands full with her domestic ties, and, so 
far as we know, they were her sole preoccupation. 
Unlike many of the seventeenth-century dames, 
she does not appear to have taken much heed of 
the big issues that were agitating the country. 
Her husband, meanwhile, though absorbed in 
his business, kept a watchful eye on local affairs. 
A new charter was granted to Huntingdon in 
July 1630, and he was named a Justice of 
the Peace. Henceforth the town was to be 
governed by a mayor and twelve aldermen 
appointed for life. Cromwell saw in this a 
danger to the rights of the poorer inhabitants, 
and he spoke with such vehemence and uncon- 
trolled anger on this point that the mayor and 

43 



Oliver Cromwell 

aldermen complained to the Privy Council and 
he was sent in custody to London. The charges 
against him were heard by the Duke of Man- 
chester, and the matter was peaceably settled 
by Cromwell's frank acknowledgment that he 
had spoken in the heat of passion and by his 
expressed desire that what he had said might 
be forgotten. 

Cromwell returned home to resume his ordi- 
nary life, but the dispute had left a sting behind 
it and the townsfolk were now less cordial to- 
ward their one-time member. It was no doubt 
partly on this account and partly because of 
his increasing family that he meditated a mo- 
mentous step. What long talks there must have 
been in the family circle before he finally decided 
to sell his property at Huntingdon for £1800 
and move to St Ives, five miles farther down 
the Ouse, where he rented good grazing land! 

St Ives was little more than a village, with 
a row of houses fronting the river and the 
dignity of a cattle-market for local trade. Here 
Cromwell used to come on market-days to sell his 
stock and to discuss with neighbouring farmers 
the state of the crops and the state of the king- 
dom. He attended the parish church regularly 
with his wife and elder children, and as in that 
marshy country he was subject to colds and 
sore throats, and he was also indifferent to his 

44 



mm/ 




HE WAS SENT IX CUSTODY TO LOX 



Quiet Years 

personal appearance, he might be seen at times 
with his neck swathed in red flannel. Religion 
was not only a matter of Sundays with him; 
on weekdays he would gather his labourers and 
children round him, read the Bible to them and 
pray with them. 

At all times, and especially in the long winter 
evenings, he read and re-read the Bible, until 
its phraseology became his familiar speech; so 
much did this become a habit that at times to 
modern ears, accustomed to greater reticence in 
matters of faith, it seems tinged with hypocrisy. 
But it was not so. It is difficult for us to-day 
with our easy access to public libraries and cheap 
editions of the classics to understand how in 
many a Puritan household the Bible was the 
one and only book of literature and religion. 
The Cromwell family Bible, which can be seen 
in the London Museum, is not the glorious 
authorized version, but the Geneva Bible, a 
translation made by English exiles in Geneva, 
and used in English households in Elizabeth's 
day. But Cromwell must have gone too for 
inspiration to the authorized version, one of the 
great monuments of our literature, which was 
completed in the reign of James I, since, as we 
have already said, his master at Sidney Sussex 
College, Cambridge, was one of the translators. 
The Bible was in truth a lantern to Cromwell's 

45 



Oliver Cromwell 

feet and a light to his path, and his mind was 
saturated with its message. ■ 

In spite of the hostility of the bishops, the 
Puritans still contrived to retain the services 
of lecturers. The first letter of Cromwell's 
which has been preserved deals with this matter. 
It is dated from St Ives and was written to a 
certain Mr Storie, at the Sign of the Dog, in the 
Royal Exchange, London. He begs his corre- 
spondent not to withdraw a lecturer's pay, for 
"it were a piteous thing to see a lecture fall, 
in the hands of so many able and godly men 
as I am persuaded the founders of this are; in 
these times wherein we see they are suppressed 
with too much haste and violence by the enemies 
of God his Truth." 

At the time this letter was written, Cromwell's 
uncle, Sir Thomas Steward, lay dying at Ely, 
and on January 30, 1636, he was buried in the 
cathedral. Cromwell was his heir and inherited 
the glebe house "and the goodwill to the 
farming of the tithes under the chapter." 

To that house hard by St Mary's Church 
(it was still standing in 1845) the family moved 
in the middle of the year. It was a low, two- 
storied building, with irregular gables, and was 
unpretentious without and within. Cromwell's 
mother and unmarried sisters, who had remained 
at Huntingdon during his residence at St Ives, 

46 



Quiet Years 

now rejoined him. The house can have been 
none too big for them all. His seventh child 
had been born at St Ives, but had died the day 
after his baptism, and two daughters, Mary and 
Frances, who were born at Ely, now completed 
the family. 

The first break of parting came when the two 
elder boys were sent off to school at Felstead, a 
place which was doubtless chosen because it 
was near their grandfather's home. There they 
could forget their home-sickness on half -holiday 
visits. When Robert was of an age to leave he 
caught the smallpox and died at school. He 
was a lad of promise very near to his father's 
heart. "Now Robert was a youth of singular 
piety, fearing God more than ordinary" — so 
runs in Latin the record of his death in the 
parish register. Years afterward, when the 
father himself lay dying, his mind reverted to 
the agony of that bereavement. 

The sorrowing man returned to his work. 
If at times a great weariness of the soul came 
upon him he did not allow it to sap his industry. 
At Ely no less than at St Ives and Huntingdon, 
as occasion served, he championed the rights of 
the poor. Thus, when a useful scheme for the 
drainage of the fens was proposed he did his 
best to put a stop to it, as he feared it would 
encroach on the grazing rights of the people. 

47 



Oliver Cromwell 

The country folk looked to him for assistance in 
these troubles, and he came to be nicknamed 
the "Lord of the Fens." The time was now at 
hand when he was to have an ampler field for 
the exercise of his gifts, and to show what 
manner of man the stern farmer of Ely had 
grown to be in the eleven years since he had 
sat in Parliament. 



48 



CHAPTER VII: King Charles 
sows the TVind 

PARLIAMENTS are altogether in my 
power for their calling, sitting, and dis- 
solution, therefore as I find the fruits 
of them good or evil, they are to continue or 
not to be." 

The King had spoken. During the eleven 
years in which Cromwell was employed raising 
crops in the Fen country, Charles was sowing 
another kind of grain that was to ripen for the 
dread harvest of Civil War. 

The royal exchequer was empty. Parliament 
was not sitting to vote supplies, grudgingly, with 
various unpleasant conditions attached to them 
— what, therefore, was the King to do? An 
ingenious device occurred to him: he looked 
up ancient statutes that were more honoured 
in the breach than in the observance and put 
them into force once more. Cromwell was 
among the unlucky country gentlemen who, 
having an estate worth over £40 and having 
neglected to take up his knighthood, was fined 
£10. A 'Commission of Forests' was also 
helpful in defining the exact extent of the 
Crown lands and in imposing heavy fines on 
landowners whose ancestors had encroached 

49 



Oliver Cromwell 

upon them. Now came the turn of the city 
folk. The little London of that day was over- 
crowded, and a movement to the suburbs — 
suburbs that are now in the very heart of the 
great metropolis — had begun. A royal procla- 
mation forbade the building of houses outside 
a certain radius, and builders who neglected to 
observe it had to pay for their disobedience. 
Town and country folk alike were hit by another 
device — the revival of 'monopolies' — which had 
been abolished by an Act of Parliament in the 
reign of James I. They resembled in some way 
the gigantic trusts and combines of to-day, 
since the customer could not go to a rival firm 
if goods were too dear. He either had to buy 
his soap and salt and other indispensable 
articles from the monopolist, who could charge 
as much as he liked, or go without them 
altogether. 

Nearly every one was beginning to feel the 
pinch of poverty. The King grew unpopular. 
Could he have read the signs of the times he 
would have found an ominous warning in the 
ever-increasing number of people who sought 
new lands for old and emigrated to America. 

The Star Chamber, which in its earlier day 
was useful as a check on powerful nobles who 
could not otherwise be brought to justice, 
Charles now used for the purpose of extorting 

So 



King Charles sows the Wind 

money from his subjects who failed to comply 
with the royal will. It also had the power of 
inflicting cruel punishments. 

Cromwell at St Ives must often have dis- 
cussed the terrible penalty meted out to 
William Prynne, a young barrister of fanatically 
Puritan convictions. To him playhouses were 
haunts of the evil one, and players and play- 
goers were alike doomed to perdition. Un- 
fortunately for himself, he felt it his solemn 
duty to inform them of their peril. Since the 
Queen often went to the theatre, the volume 
was considered to be an attack on her. Prynne 
was brought before the Star Chamber, sentenced 
to stand twice in the pillory, have both his ears 
cut off, and be imprisoned for life. 

Nor was he the only victim; other Puritan 
pamphleteers shared a like, if not a worse, fate. 
Thus John Lilburn, for publishing 'seditious 
libels,' was heavily fined, condemned to stand 
in the pillory, and was whipped at the cart's 
tail from the Fleet Prison to the gate of 
Westminster Hall. The worst sentence of all 
was passed upon Dr Leighton. He could 
hardly have hoped to escape the rigours of a 
Star Chamber sentence, since in his pamphlet, 
An Appeal to the Parliament, he had the au- 
dacity to call the bishops "Men of Blood, 
Ravens, and Magpies that prey upon the State, 

5i 



Oliver Cromwell 

and His Majesty's Royal Consort, our gracious 
Queen, the Daughter of Heth." For this, 
together with his commendation of the mur- 
derer of the Duke of Buckingham, after being 
degraded of his ministry, "he shall for further 
punishment and example to others be brought 
to the pillory at Westminster and there 
whipped, and after his whipping be set upon 
the pillory for some convenient space, and have 
one of his ears cut off, and his nose slit, and be 
branded in the face with a double SS, for a 
sower of sedition, and shall then be carried to 
the Prison of the Fleet and at some other 
convenient time afterwards shall be carried 
into the pillory at Cheapside, upon a Market 
Day, and there be likewise whipt and then be 
set upon the pillory, and have his other ear cut 
off, and from thence be carried back to the 
prison of the Fleet, there to remain during life, 
unless His Majesty be graciously pleased to 
enlarge him." The wretched man succeeded 
in making his escape, and there was a hue and 
cry after him. He was caught in Bedfordshire 
and the sentence was duly executed. Would 
anybody with the slightest grain of humanity 
be a party to catching such a malefactor now 
to undergo such a sentence? 

Apart from the ever-increasing influence of 
the Queen, Charles's main counsellors were Sir 

52 



King Charles sows the Wind 

Thomas Wentworth and Archbishop Laud. 
The former, as we have seen, had first come 
into prominence as a champion of the rights of 
Parliament, but when it came to choosing 
between King and Commons, he threw in his 
lot unreservedly with the monarch. He was 
a man of ability with a power of command. 
He now concentrated the whole force of his 
gloomy nature on one object — the establishment 
in England of a despotism as rigorous as the 
one which his contemporary, Cardinal Richelieu, 
had established in France. To this policy, 
which was "to vindicate the Monarchy for ever 
from the conditions and restraints of subjects," 
he gave the name of 'Thorough.' In 1628 he 
was created President of the Council of the 
North and in 1632 Lord Deputy of Ireland. 

Laud, his colleague in the royal counsels, was 
a sincere man, of limited intelligence, super- 
stitious and narrow-minded. He, Clarendon 
says, courted "persons too little, nor cared to 
make his design and purposes appear as candid 
as they were, by showing them in any other 
dress than their own natural beauty and rough- 
ness; and did not consider enough what men 
said or were like to say." Like his royal master 
he loved the forms and ceremonies of church 
worship, splendid vestments, richly adorned 
churches, and the beautiful English liturgy. 

53 



Oliver Cromwell 

But though it was not his intention, as the 
Puritans feared, to place the country once more 
under the yoke of the Papacy, it was his inten- 
tion to suppress Puritanism with the utmost 
rigour. 

Wentworth and Laud were alike in their 
hatred of opposition and in their inability to 
understand or appreciate other points of view; 
consequently they were unsuitable counsellors 
in a country germinating with new ideas and 
challenging accepted beliefs. 

Popular discontent was fanned into flame 
when in 1635 the King attempted to levy 
Ship-Money (an impost exacted in time of 
war from the maritime provinces) in time of 
peace from the inland counties. Charles con- 
descended to explain his reasons to his in- 
dignant subjects: " We are given to understand 
that certain thieves, pirates, and robbers of the 
sea as well as Turks, enemies of the Christian 
name as others, have spoiled and molested the 
shipping and merchandise of our own subjects 
and those of friendly powers." The judges 
were on the King's side, since they informed 
him that "Your Majesty is the sole judge both 
of the danger and when and how the same is 
to be prevented and avoided." But he had 
gone too far. London protested, and many 
private individuals refused to pay; among 

54 



King Charles sows the Wind 

them was John Hampden. Proceedings were 
taken against him and the trial opened on 
November 6, 1637. Oliver's cousin, "Mr 
St John, a dark tough man of the toughness of 
leather, spake with irrefragable law eloquence, 
law logic, for three days running on Mr Hamp- 
den's side." Hampden, though he lost his case, 
won the gratitude of the oppressed nation. 

Not content with sowing dissension in Eng- 
land, Charles, still with the best intentions, 
proceeded to alienate Scotland. The Scottish 
people, deeply influenced by the doctrines of 
Calvin, had accepted the Reformation far more 
completely than the English. There the Pres- 
byterian system of Church government was 
accepted. Charles now determined to bring 
the Scottish Church into complete uniformity 
with the English, and ordered that the Book of 
Common Prayer should be used in all the 
churches. When on Sunday, July 23, 1637, 
an attempt was made to read it in St Giles's 
Cathedral, Edinburgh, a militant of the period, 
Jenny Geddes by name, threw a stool at the 
preacher's head. The act was symbolic of the 
attitude of the nation. The following year, in 
the churchyard of the Greyfriars at Edinburgh, 
a 'Covenant with God' was signed amid scenes 
of wild enthusiasm: "We promise and swear 
by the great name of the Lord our God, to 

55 



Oliver Cromwell 

continue in the profession and obedience of the 
said religion, and that we shall defend the same, 
and resist all their contrary errors and cor- 
ruptions, according to our vocation and the 
utmost of that power which God has put into 
our hands all the days of our life." 'Deeds, 
not words,' was the intention of these men, and 
armed Covenanters now marched south. 

Great Britain was seething with discontent 
when in 1639 the King summoned Wentworth 
from Ireland to consult with him about what 
was to be done. Early in 1640 he was raised 
to the peerage as Earl of Strafford. On his 
advice a new Parliament was summoned to 
meet on April 13, 1640. To it Oliver Cromwell 
was returned as member for Cambridge. 

The eleven years of despotism had taught the 
King nothing of the temper of the country. 
The breech had widened between him and the 
Commons. He needed immediate supplies and 
he promised that if these were granted he would 
later on consider the question of grievances. 
The House wanted an assurance that Ship- 
Money and other illegal taxation should be 
abolished before they voted a penny for the 
royal exchequer. Charles, after a sitting of 
twenty -three days, dissolved the Short Parlia- 
ment (as it was afterward called) in anger. 
He had not, however, dashed the hopes of 

56 



King Charles sows the Wind 

ardent reformers. "Things must be worse 
before they could be better," Cromwell's 
cousin, St John, observed. 

The King was getting deeper and deeper into 
difficulties. The Covenanters had routed his 
troops in the north. Now he was resolved, cost 
what it might, to reduce the northern kingdom 
to submission. There was nothing for it but 
to summon a Parliament, and this was destined 
to be the last one of his reign. 



57 



CHAPTER VIII: The Long 
Parliament 

CROMWELL, re-elected member for Cam- 
bridge, took his seat in the Parliament 
which met on November 3, 1640. He 
was no longer an obscure country member, but 
a mature man of forty-one with Parliamentary 
experience. A few days later he presented the 
petition of John Lilburn, one of the victims of 
Star Chamber injustice. His appearance at 
this time was noted by Sir Philip Warwick, 
who was present: "The first time I ever took 
notice of Mr Cromwell was in the very begin- 
ning of the Parliament held in November 1640, 
when I vainly thought myself a courtly young 
gentleman — for we courtiers valued ourselves 
much upon our good clothes ! I came into the 
House one morning well clad and perceived a 
gentleman speaking, whom I knew not — very 
ordinarily apparelled; for it was a plain cloth 
suit, which seemed to have been made by an ill 
country tailor; his linen was plain, and not 
very clean; and I remember a speck or two of 
blood upon his little band, which was not much 
larger than his collar. His hat was without a 
hatband. His stature was of a good size; his 
sword stuck close to his side: his countenance 

58 



The Long Parliament 

swollen and reddish, his voice sharp and untune- 
able, and his eloquence full of fervour." 

Lilburn's petition was practically ignored be- 
cause of the preoccupation of the House with 
the King's ministers. Strafford was the first 
to come up for trial, for he and his policy of 
'Thorough' were considered responsible for 
much of the King's misgovernment. The im- 
peachment passed both Lords and Commons, 
and Strafford's trial commenced on March 22, 
1641. Cromwell, though he took no special 
part in it, was as a member of the House of Com- 
mons among his accusers. The Puritan member 
for Cambridge must have looked sombre enough 
among the crowd that thronged the hall with 
"the most glorious assembly the isle could 
afford." The King was present watching the 
proceedings with an aching heart, and the 
Queen had thought fit to bring two of their 
children to see the Earl in his hour of agony. 
To many present the trial was but a day's 
pleasuring, and in the intervals the hall was 
turned into a picnicking ground, with "much 
public eating not only of confections but of flesh 
and bread," and "bottles of beer and wine going 
thick from mouth to mouth without cups." 

Strafford defended himself so ably that his 
accusers, fearing to lose their case, dropped the 
impeachment and brought in a Bill of Attainder, 

59 



Oliver Cromwell 

which passed through Lords and Commons. 
It required but one signature. Would the King 
desert his minister in his hour of need? For 
two days he was torn by indecision, and then 
signed the death-warrant. "Put not your 
trust in Princes," cried Strafford, when he knew 
that his doom was sealed. Archbishop Laud, 
who was not permitted to give him the last 
consolations of the Church, looking out of the 
window of his prison in the Tower, blessed him 
as he passed to the scaffold. Strafford was 
Roman in his bearing. "I thank God I am no 
more afraid of death," he said, "but as cheer- 
fully put off my doublet at this time as ever 
I did when I went to bed." 

The surging populace roared their delight 
at his execution. "His head is off! His head 
is off!" they shouted in triumph as they lit 
their bonfires and rang their bells in an orgy of 
rejoicing. 

As yet only a spectator in these dramatic 
scenes, Cromwell was rapidly gaining Parlia- 
mentary experience, and sat on no less than 
eighteen committees called to consider the 
petitions and grievances from boroughs and 
councils. Every now and again his fiery temper 
got the better of him and he would insult the 
witnesses. But his eloquence was beginning 
to make an impression on the House. A 

60 




FOR TWO DAYS HE WAS TORN BY INDECISION, AND THEN 

SIGNED 



The Long Parliament 

contemporary says that he spoke "with a 
strong and masculine excellence, more able to 
persuade than to be persuaded. His expressions 
were hardy, opinions resolute, asseverations 
grave and vehement, always intermixed (An- 
dronicus-like) with sentences of Scripture, to 
give them the greater weight, and the better to 
insinuate into the affections of the people. He 
expressed himself with some kind of passion, 
but with such a commanding wise deportment 
till, at his pleasure, he governed and swayed 
the House, and he had most time the leading 
voice. Those who find no such wonder in his 
speeches may find it in the effect of them." 

He was on the committee which debated the 
Triennial Bill, which passed both Houses and 
was reluctantly signed by the King. By it a 
Parliament had to be called every three years. 
This was but one of the checks on absolute 
monarchy. The Star Chamber and other ar- 
bitrary courts were abolished, and Ship-Money 
was declared illegal. The Tonnage and Pound- 
age Act forbade the levying of any charge upon 
exports or imports without consent of Parlia- 
ment. 

Cromwell, who had been known in the Fen 
country as 'a speaker for sectaries/ came more 
prominently forward in the ecclesiastical dis- 
cussions. He was among those who wished to 

61 



Oliver Cromwell 

abolish episcopacy 'root and branch' — bishops, 
Prayer Book and all. On this question of the 
religious reform there was a serious split in the 
popular party, and Lord Falkland and Hyde, 
afterward Lord Clarendon, the Royalist historian 
of this epoch, went over to the King's side. 

The monarch had been compelled to set the 
royal seal to these distasteful measures, but he 
had no intention of being a pawn in the hands 
of Parliament. He departed for Scotland, 
anxious now to propitiate his subjects there. 

News of more grave import came from Ire- 
land. The Irish people, Roman Catholics as 
we know, left to their own devices when 
Strafford's iron hand had been removed, had 
broken into revolt against the English Protes- 
tant settlers in Ulster. Terrible reports were 
in circulation as to the thousands that had been 
massacred there and the nameless atrocities 
that had been committed. When the tidings 
reached the House, " there was deep silence and 
a kind of consternation." Rumour was rife, 
stating that the Irish had a commission signed 
by the King; as a matter of fact they actually 
held a forged commission. Still this served to 
increase his unpopularity, especially when his 
cold comment on the situation became known: 
"I hope this ill news in Ireland may hinder 
some of these follies in England." 

62 



The Long Parliament 

The reform party now prepared a Grand 
Remonstrance, and in November 1641, Pym 
placed it before the Commons. In it were 
detailed the work that had been accomplished, 
the difficulties that had been surmounted, and 
the new dangers which had to be faced. Pym's 
hold on his party had slackened, for many men 
had changed sides. A fierce discussion took 
place and there was a scene of tumult in the 
House. Members lost control of themselves, 
waved their hats and unsheathed their swords, 
until it seemed as if the verbal warfare would 
end in actual strife. After a debate of sixteen 
hours the Remonstrance was carried by the 
narrow majority of eleven. As the chimes of 
St Margaret's were striking two the members 
passed out on their homeward way. Cromwell, 
walking down the stairs with Lord Falkland, 
emphasized his view of the momentousness of 
the issue. "If the Remonstrance had been 
rejected," he declared, "I would have sold all 
I had the next morning, and never have seen 
England any more; and I know there are many 
other honest men of this same resolution." 

Charles now decided to play a trump card 
and to arrest as traitors the five Parliamentary 
ringleaders, Pym, Hampden, Holies, Haselrig, 
and Strode. As yet Cromwell had not come 
sufficiently forward to be under the royal ban. 

63 



Oliver Cromwell 

On January 4, 1642, the King rode down to the 
House with a rabble of four hundred Royalists 
at his heels. Parliament was sitting when the 
news that he was on his way thither spread like 
wildfire from bench to bench. The five mem- 
bers, warned in time, were hurried into a boat 
and rowed to the city. The King, leaving his 
retinue in Westminster Hall, crossed the thres- 
hold of the House, uncovered his head, and 
demanded the surrender of the offenders. 

"I have neither eyes to see, nor tongue to 
speak in this place but as this House is pleased 
to direct me," replied the Speaker to the 
demand to produce the culprits. 

"Well, well, I think my eyes are as good as 
another's," answered the King as he surveyed 
the House; "I see all the birds are flown. I 
do expect you will send them to me as soon 
as they return hither." 

He left the House in a passion, to be received 
by the waiting mob outside with cries of 
' ' Privilege ! Privilege ! ' ' 

The last seed of his misgovernment had been 
sown and the crop was now ripe for Civil War. 
A peaceful settlement was impossible. The 
Queen crossed the Channel to seek aid from 
abroad, taking with her the Crown jewels. The 
King left Whitehall for Hampton Court, never 
to return until his hour of doom. 

64 



CHAPTER IX: Civil War 

THE day after the King's departure the 
five members returned in triumph, and 
the House set to work at once to inquire 
into the ' state of the kingdom.' The next few 
months were occupied with fruitless negotia- 
tions between King and Parliament. The King 
was swayed by a double policy — that of the 
Queen, who advocated resort to arms, and that 
of the far shrewder Hyde, who saw that the 
Commons, no less than the King, were bound by 
law. Hence, he advised his royal master to 
accede in all demands made upon him that were 
sanctioned by law, and to refuse, if convenient, 
every claim that was contrary to 'the known 
laws of the land.' This policy won him many 
adherents among people of moderate views, 
since it made him, and not the Commons, the 
advocate of the "ancient, equal, happy, well- 
poised, and never enough commended con- 
stitution." 

But it did not stave off war. The King, 
though vacillating in judgment, was at times 
trenchant in his replies to demands that were 
infringements of his royal prerogative. "By 
God, not for an hour ! You have asked that of 
me in this was never asked of a king, and with 

65 



Oliver Cromwell 

which I will not trust my wife and children" 
— so he answered when asked to surrender the 
control of the Militia. 

The Queen, as we have seen, went abroad 
to seek foreign alliances. As a safe landing- 
place for foreign troops Charles decided to 
obtain possession of Hull. When on April 23, 
1642, he approached the town with a company 
of three hundred horsemen, an unwonted sight 
met his eyes — the drawbridge was up, and the 
governor, Sir John Hotham, stood on the wall 
and refused him admittance. There was 
nothing for it but to brand him as a traitor 
and ride away. This act of defiance was the 
actual beginning of hostilities. 

For the next few months both sides were 
making active preparations for war, and Crom- 
well was one of the most assiduous in its organ- 
ization. On July 15 he obtained the permission 
of Parliament to allow the townsmen of Cam- 
bridge to raise two companies of volunteers, 
and he sent down arms for the defence of the 
town. On August 15 he was on the spot himself, 
seized the castle, and prevented the University 
plate, worth some £20,000, from being carried 
off. 

A little over a month later, on August 22, 
Charles raised the royal standard on the castle 
rock at Nottingham. As it blew free over the 

66 



Civil War 

motley crowd of soldiers, courtiers, and on- 
lookers, cheers rent the air for the Royalist 
cause. "God save King Charles and hang 
up the Roundheads!" cried the spectators. 
(Roundheads was the nickname bestowed on 
the close-cropped Puritans, who started the pre- 
sent fashion for men of wearing the hair short.) 
But the hearts of the crowd were heavy within 
them. The beat of drum and the blare of 
trumpet did not drown their inward misgiving. 
Rain drenched the royal banner as if the cause 
were bathed in tears, storm wrenched it from 
its bearings, and it fell to the ground. "An ill 
omen !" whispered one to another. The elders 
among them recalled that day some sixteen 
years before when the King had been crowned. 
Had he not worn white, the emblem of inno- 
cence, rather than the royal purple? Had not 
the preacher appointed for the occasion chosen 
for his text, "Be thou faithful unto death and I 
will give thee a crown of life" ? — an inauspicious 
message for one who stood on the threshold, 
not of a new life, but of a new reign ! 

The more strenuous of the King's followers 
soon put aside these forebodings. All must be 
ready for active service. His two nephews, 
Prince Rupert and Prince Maurice, both held 
high command; the former, a gallant young 
man of two and twenty, was appointed general 

67 



Oliver Cromwell 

of the horse. Some ten thousand men had 
flocked to the royal banner. 

The Parliamentary army, under the Earl of 
Essex, Commander of the Forces, had chosen 
Northampton as the rallying-point. Hither 
came about 14,000 men, and 6000 more were 
reckoned among their numbers, thus making 
their available force double that of the King's. 
But at the outset at least the Royalists had the 
superiority in discipline and experience, and 
to outward eye all the bravery and show were 
on their side. The gallant Cavaliers, the Lords 
and gentlemen who formed the King's Life- 
guards, wore plumed casques over their flowing 
locks, embroidered collars over their glittering 
cuirasses, gay scarfs, golden swords, and belts. 
The Guards of the Earl of Essex wore buff 
leather coats and breeches — later the uniform 
of the whole Parliamentary army; Hampden's 
men were clad in green, and the London trained 
bands in scarlet. 

Though, for our present purpose, we can 
think of England at this time only as in two 
different camps — Royalist and Roundhead — 
still, as a matter of fact, no small number of 
people sat on the fence to await events. In 
order to be on the safe side men would send 
one son to fight for the Parliament, another for 
the King. Some of the nobility, according to 

68 



Civil War 

Clarendon, were entirely self-seeking: "Pem- 
broke and Salisbury had rather the King and 
his posterity should be destroyed than that 
Wilton should be taken from one and Hatfield 
the other." Houses were divided and brother 
fought against brother, father against son. 
And though the name of Cromwell was des- 
tined for ever to be associated with this great 
upheaval, the head of his house, Sir Oliver, 
and other of his kinsmen were ardent Royalists. 
Speaking generally, we may say that the flower 
of the nobility, the larger landowners, and a 
good proportion of wealthy tradesmen were 
for the Crown, while peers of lesser degree, the 
smaller gentry, and the bulk of the merchants 
and traders were for Parliament. This, and 
the geographical grouping — the North and 
West for the King, the Eastern and home 
counties and most of the manufacturing towns, 
including the City of London, for Parliament — 
is subject to modification, since many changed 
sides according to the fortune of war. 

The Parliamentary party had the whip-hand 
in respect to the command of money. In 
spite of the heroic sacrifices of his followers, who 
melted down their plate and sold their jewels 
to fill his exchequer, the King still suffered from 
chronic lack of supplies. 

Before turning our attention to the campaign 

69 



Oliver Cromwell 

it is as well to say a few words about the methods 
of warfare in the seventeenth century. The 
discovery of gunpowder some three centuries 
before and the invention of firearms had revo- 
lutionized the art of war. Cap-a-pie armour 
had long disappeared from the battle-field, 
since, apart from its terrible weight, plate- 
armour was not proof against bullets. But, as 
we can see in portraits of the period, helmet 
and breastplate were still worn. Yet, since 
the firearms of those days were clumsy and 
difficult to load, too much reliance was not 
placed on the musketeers, and the pikemen had 
a full share of the work in a charge at close 
quarters. The foot-soldiers had to yield pride 
of place to the cavalry, armed with sword and 
pistol, for to them throughout the Civil War 
fell the largest share of the honours of victory. 
Charles's plan of campaign was to march on 
London, and Essex determined to intercept 
him on the road. The rival forces met at 
Edgehill in Warwickshire, where, on Sunday 
afternoon, October 23, the first battle was 
fought. Cromwell received his baptism of fire 
that day, and was honourably mentioned as 
having remained with his troop and fought 
to the finish. Indeed, his valour and that 
of other leaders of the Parliamentary army 
turned what might have been a Royalist 

70 




PRINCE 11UPERT AT EDGEHILL 



Civil War 

victory into an indecisive encounter in which 
both parties claimed the honours. The prac- 
tical advantages were, however, on the side of 
the King, who marched South, captured Ban- 
bury and reached Oxford, where, since London 
remained hostile, he fixed his head-quarters. 

Cromwell had not missed the lesson of Edge- 
hill. "Why was it that the Roundheads had 
not given a better account of themselves?" 
he asked. It was about this time that he had 
a conversation with Hampden that was to have 
momentous consequences, and in after years 
he himself spoke of that interview: 

"I was a person who, from my first employ- 
ment, was suddenly preferred and lifted up 
from lesser trusts to greater; from my first 
being a captain of a troop of horse. ... I had 
a very worthy friend then; and he was a very 
noble person, and I know his memory is very 
grateful to all — Mr John Hampden. At my 
first going out into this engagement, I saw our 
men were beaten at every hand. . . . 'Your 
troops,' said I, "are most of them old decayed 
serving men, and tapsters, and such kind of fel- 
lows; and/ said I, 'their troops are gentlemen's 
sons, younger sons, and persons of quality: 
do you think that the spirits of such base mean 
fellows will ever be able to encounter gentlemen, 
that have honour and courage and resolution 

7i 



Oliver Cromwell 

in them?' Truly did I represent to him in this 
manner conscientiously; and truly I did tell 
him: 'You must get men of a spirit: and 
take it not ill what I say, I know you will not 
— of a spirit that is likely to go on as far as 
gentlemen will go: or else you will be beaten 
still.' I told him so; I did truly. He was a 
wise and worthy person; and he did think 
that I talked a good notion, but an impracticable 
one." 

Cromwell's own training in military matters 
was almost wholly in practical experience, but 
some of his biographers assert that he availed 
himself of the instruction of Captain Dalbier, 
which stood him in good stead when he set to 
work to raise and to drill into efficient soldiers 
"such men as had the fear of God before them, 
as made some conscience of what they did — 
men who are religious and godly." 

The year 1642 wore to its close with no chance 
of settlement on either side, and the balance of 
advantage was on the side of the King. Early 
in January 1643, Cromwell was in the Eastern 
counties recruiting for the New Model Army. 



72 



CHAPTER X: The Triumph of 
the Ironsides 

DURING the first few months of 1643 
Cromwell was working for the realiza- 
tion of his dream. He was wise in his 
selection of men; character was the test. He 
was, as we know, a Puritan, but that name 
covered as many different varieties of faith as 
the word Dissenter does to-day. There were 
many sects — Cromwell himself was an Inde- 
pendent — but he was tolerant to all within the 
Puritan fold. Other leaders were less broad- 
minded, and when Major-General Crawford 
dismissed one of his captains for being an Ana- 
baptist, Cromwell wrote to him in indignation: 
"The State in choosing men to serve it takes 
no notice of their opinions; if they be willing 
faithfully to serve it, that satisfies." He was 
also convinced that, though good birth was not 
without its advantages, other considerations 
were far more important. "I had rather," he 
declared, "have a plain russet-coated captain 
that knows what he fights for and loves what 
he knows, than that which you call 'a gentle- 
man,' and is nothing else. I honour a gentle- 
man that is so indeed. . . , It may be it 
provokes some spirits to see such plain men 

73 



Oliver Cromwell 

made captains of horse. It had been well that 
men of honour and birth had entered into these 
employments — but why do they not appear? 
But seeing it was necessary the work must go 
on, better plain men than none." 

At the opening of the Civil War certain 
counties had banded together and pooled their 
resources for mutual defence. Thus Norfolk, 
Suffolk, Essex, Cambridge, Hertfordshire, and 
later on Huntingdonshire and Lincolnshire, 
formed one group — the most famous of all — 
known as the Eastern Association, with Cam- 
bridge as its headquarters and Cromwell as 
the leading spirit. 

From these counties he recruited c a lovely 
company' — in all ten troops of soldiers, who 
were later to earn by their intrepidity in the 
field the honourable title of Ironsides. The 
discipline was strict; no plunder was allowed, 
swearing was punished by a fine of twelve pence, 
and drunkenness by the stocks. 

In four months this trained band was ready 
for active service, with their leader, now Colonel 
Cromwell, in supreme command for the first 
time. He was reinforced by other soldiers 
inferior in character and training. He had 
been ordered to relieve Lincolnshire, for Newark 
on the borders was a Royalist stronghold, 
and a Parliamentary force was besieged in 

74 



The Triumph of the Ironsides 

Gainsborough. His ultimate object was to go 
North and join Lord Fairfax, who was holding 
his own against the Earl of Newcastle with 
head-quarters at Hull. 

Cromwell encountered the Royalist contin- 
gent at Grantham, near Newark, and he gave 
a good account of himself in the skirmish that 
ensued. It was the first of a long series of 
successes, and he wrote of the victory with 
gratitude and pride: 

"It was late in the evening when we drew 
out: they came and faced us within two miles 
of the town. So soon as we had the alarm, we 
drew out our forces, consisting of about twelve 
troops — whereof some of them so poor and 
broken [not these of Cromwell's 'lovely com- 
pany'] that you shall seldom see worse: with 
this handful it pleased God to cast the scale. 
For after we had stood a little, above musket- 
shot the one body from the other; and the 
dragooners had fired on both sides, ... we came 
on with our troops a pretty round trot; they 
standing firm to receive us: and our men 
charging freely upon them, by God's providence 
they were immediately routed, and ran all 
away, and we had the execution of them two 
or three miles." 

He now pressed on to Gainsborough, and on 
his way thither captured Burleigh House. It 

75 



Oliver Cromwell 

was a fifty-mile march, and when he reached 
the outskirts of the town he found that the 
Royalist forces under Cavendish occupied a 
strong position on a hill. His men pressed 
gallantly up the steep slope: "When we all 
recovered the top of the hill, we saw a great 
body of the enemy's horse facing us, at about 
a musket-shot or less distance; and a good 
reserve of a full regiment of horse behind it. 
We endeavoured to put our men into as good 
order as we could. The enemy in the mean- 
time advanced toward us, to take us at dis- 
advantage; but in such order as we were we 
charged their great body, I having the right 
wing; we came up horse to horse; where we 
disputed it with our swords and pistols a pretty 
time; all keeping close order, so that one could 
not break the other." The Royalist force was 
completely routed, Cavendish was killed, and 
Gainsborough was relieved — to be taken and 
retaken again in the course of the war. 

But a new peril was awaiting Cromwell's 
regiment, for Newcastle, with the main body of 
the Northern Royalist army, was in the neigh- 
bourhood. To risk an encounter would have 
been madness, for defeat would have left the 
way to London open to the victors. With 
consummate skill he managed to draw off his 
men. Three days later he was at Huntingdon 

76 



The Triumph of the Ironsides 

making urgent appeals for troops to stay the 
march of Newcastle's army. In August he 
wrote to the Commissioners at Cambridge: 
"Raise all your bands; send them to Hunting- 
don; get up what volunteers you can; hasten 
your horses." And in another letter a day or 
two later he appealed for pay for his troops 
who were in dire need : " Gentlemen, make them 
able to live and subsist that are willing to spend 
their blood for you." 

The House of Commons ordered that the 
force should be raised to 10,000 men; Man- 
chester was appointed Commander of the 
Eastern Association and Cromwell Sergeant- 
Ma j or of the Associated Counties. 

In spite of Cromwell's successes, things were 
looking black for the Parliamentary cause. 
The Royalists were triumphing in many parts 
of the country. Gainsborough was recaptured 
and the whole of Lincolnshire except Boston 
fell into their hands. Bristol, the key to the 
West, had been captured by Prince Rupert; 
Dorchester had surrendered, and practically 
the whole county of Dorset was in the hands of 
the Royalists. Cromwell's work, however, did 
not lie in the South, and here Parliament ap- 
pointed Sir William Waller to direct operations. 

Cromwell joined Manchester and then set out 
to recapture Lincolnshire. They came upon a 

77 



Oliver Cromwell 

Royalist force at Winceby on October 11, 1643, 
and Cromwell, leading the van, fell with brave 
resolution upon the enemy. His horse was 
killed under him, but he sprang to his feet — 
only to be knocked down by a Cavalier. It was 
but for an instant. He was up again, seized 
a trooper's horse, remounted, and was in the 
thick of the fight, leading his men to victory. 
This brought Lincolnshire once more within 
the Parliamentary fold, and Lord Fairfax's 
triumph over Newcastle outside Hull greatly 
strengthened the position. 

Both the King and Parliament considered it 
wise to seek other alliances and not to rely on 
England alone. Charles looked to Catholic 
Ireland and sent an appeal to Lord Ormond for 
troops; several regiments were sent over. 
Parliament looked to Protestant Scotland, and 
the northern kingdom, as a price for her aid, 
demanded the signing of the Solemn League and 
Covenant by the English people. The terms 
were accepted and in St Margaret's Church 
in Westminster members of both Houses fore- 
gathered, and swore with uplifted hands to 
extirpate " popery, prelacy, superstition, schism, 
and profaneness." This was the last work of 
the fine leader John Pym — 'King Pym,' as 
he was nicknamed by the Royalists. Ere the 
year closed his career was over. 

78 



The Triumph of the Ironsides 

The same year, 1643, marked the end of two 
other men, widely differing in point of view 
but alike in the purity of their motives. John 
Hampden, whose name is written in letters of 
gold in the annals of England, received his 
death-wound in a skirmish with Prince Rupert 
at Chalgrove Field. Lesser than he, and yet 
a man of great parts, Viscount Falkland, reck- 
lessly exposing himself in battle, fell fighting for 
the King at Newbury. Historians on both 
sides paid ungrudging tribute to his noble 
generous nature. He was able to see the good 
in friend as well as in foe, and his craving was 
for peace. He was "one of that rare band of 
the sons of time who find the world too vexed 
and rough a scene for them, but to whom his- 
tory will never grudge her tenderest memories." 

The early days of January 1644 were to 
mark the last stage of Archbishop Laud's 
earthly pilgrimage. He was sentenced to death 
by Lords and Commons and left the Tower for 
the scaffold. The King's heart may well have 
failed him on that winter day when Laud's 
grey hairs had not saved him from sharing 
Strafford's fate. 

The New Year had opened well for Parlia- 
ment and badly for the King, whose forces met 
with defeat at Nantwich and Cheriton. An 
army of 20,000 Scottish troops under Leslie 

79 



Oliver Cromwell 

crossed the border and marched to Durham. 
Newcastle, unable to bar their progress, shut 
himself up in York and was closely besieged by 
Leslie and the Fairfaxes. 

Cromwell was in London at this time and 
received further proofs of the trust that Parlia- 
ment reposed in him by being appointed a 
member of the Committee of Both Kingdoms 
and raised to the rank of Lieutenant-Gen eral, 
under Manchester. In truth, if not in name, 
Cromwell had become the leader. 

The Solemn League and Covenant was now 
to be generally signed, and Cromwell went 
down to Cambridge to force it upon the people. 
The rough, harsh, overbearing side of his nature 
was brought out by this task. That aspect of 
Puritanism which all lovers of beauty must ever 
deplore became prominent. The Puritans, in 
their zeal against all that savoured of Roman- 
ism, wantonly damaged beautiful churches, 
destroyed noble monuments to the honoured 
dead, broke ancient stained-glass windows, and 
stabled their horses in cathedrals. It was an 
irreparable loss for all time that even their 
undoubted sincerity could not excuse. 

We call to mind one scene in which Crom- 
well himself played the lead. The incumbent 
of Ely Cathedral, the Rev Mr Hitch, was 
commanded by him in a letter to " forbear 

80 



The Triumph of the Ironsides 

altogether your choir service, so unedifying and 
offensive." Mr Hitch disobeyed and continued 
his ministrations as before. Cromwell then 
appeared in person in the cathedral, and 
without the formality of removing his hat 
marched up the aisle attended by a rabble, and 
in loud, strident tones informed the congrega- 
tion: "I am a man under authority, and am 
commanded to dismiss this assembly." Then, 
turning to the clergyman who continued the 
service, he insolently bade him: "Leave off 
your fooling and come down, Sir." Mr Hitch 
was obliged to comply, but the honour and 
dignity remained on his side. 

Cromwell had more important work to do in 
the course of the year than to bully the episco- 
palian clergy and acquiesce in the mutilation 
of sacred buildings. England must be won or 
lost for Parliament before the country could 
hope for peace. Up to the present no decisive 
blow had been struck. He rejoined Manchester 
and Fairfax in the North. 

In June Prince Rupert was on the march 
northward to the relief of Newcastle and his 
6000 men shut up in York. When the Parlia- 
mentary generals received news of his intention 
they raised the siege, with the intention of 
stopping his march. But he outwitted them, 
crossing by the opposite bank of the river to 

81 



Oliver Cromwell 

the one they expected and entered the town. 
Instead of remaining there, as would have been 
wise, he marched southward to attack the 
Parliamentary forces. The two armies met at 
Marston Moor, July 2, 1644. The troops on 
both sides, separated by a ditch, were drawn up 
in battle array, with infantry in the centre, 
cavalry on the right and left wings. Cromwell 
commanded on the left with David Leslie 
under him and was opposed to Prince Rupert's 
right. The Ironsides stood to arms in the long 
corn through the gloomy wet afternoon, raising 
their voices in battle-psalms of prayer and 
praise. The evening shadows were creeping 
over the land and the Cavalier leaders, not 
expecting an attack that day, had retired to 
rest, when they were hastily summoned by the 
news that a movement was taking place in the 
opposite camp. "God with us!" was roared 
from thousands of Roundhead throats; "God 
and the King!" shouted the Cavaliers. 

At seven in the evening the battle began. 
Cromwell, backed by David Leslie, dashed 
across the ditch to engage Rupert's cavalry. 
He was slightly wounded, but "A miss is as 
good as a mile," he cried unheeding. The 
Ironsides immediately rallied from a temporary 
check, and came into hand-to-hand conflict 
with the enemy. They hacked them with their 

82 



The Triumph of the Ironsides 

swords, and, breaking through at last, scattered 
them like "a little dust/ So far all was well and 
Cromwell took a hurried survey of the battle- 
field. Fairfax was in sore plight, wounded, 
and with the greater part of his right wing 
defeated and in flight. The main struggle was 
now in the centre, where the Scottish infantry 
were being attacked in front and rear. Some 
fled before the terrible onslaught, but the 
majority stood their ground. Cromwell, by 
one of those master-strokes which reveal the 
born commander, swept across the moor at the 
head of his men, came to their aid at the right 
moment of time, and snatched victory out of 
defeat. The Royalists had fought a stubborn 
fight but the day was lost, and the flying 
soldiers were pursued in the bright July moon- 
light to within three miles of York. 

Cromwell won golden opinions for his share 
of the victory, but in a letter which he wrote 
a day or two afterward he neglected to pay a 
generous tribute to the valour of the Scots, who 
had so large a share in the honours of the day. 
In a letter to Colonel Valentine Walton he says: 
"We never charged but we routed the enemy. 
The left wing which I commanded being our 
own horse, saving a few Scots in our rear beat 
all the Prince's horse. God made them as 
stubble to our swords." On the blood-soaked, 

83 



Oliver Cromwell 

trampled corn over four thousand lay dead, 
among them Walton's young son. Cromwell 
could well understand the bitterness of such a 
blow, for the Civil War had taken toll of his 
family and his son Oliver had fallen in a 
skirmish. Very touching are the words of 
sympathy in which he tells the father of his 
loss: "God hath taken away your eldest son 
by a cannon shot . . . you know my own trials 
this way: but the Lord supported me with this, 
that the Lord took him into the happiness we 
all pant for and live for. There is your precious 
child full of glory, never to know sin or sorrow 
any more. He was a gallant young man ex- 
ceedingly gracious." 

A few weeks after the Royalist cause had 
received this crushing defeat the surrender of 
York placed the North of England beyond the 
Humber in the hands of the Parliament. 



84 



CHAPTER XI: Naseby 

THE tide of the King's fortune was not 
yet at the ebb, for success in the 
South balanced disaster in the North. 
A victory at Cropredy Bridge in Oxfordshire 
(June 1644) had dispersed Waller's forces. In 
Cornwall a greater disaster had befallen the 
Parliamentary army under Essex. He had 
hoped to conquer that county but had mis- 
calculated his chances. His army was penned 
between Lostwithiel and the sea, and, since it 
was hopeless to attack, he had fled to Plymouth, 
leaving his army to surrender. Parliament 
accepted news of the disaster 'with Roman 
fortitude.' To Cromwell it was but an ad- 
ditional evidence of Essex's unfitness for su- 
preme command. He had noticed, too, that 
Manchester was half-hearted in his attempts to 
effect a settlement by arms. "We do with 
grief of heart," he writes to Colonel Walton, 
"resent the sad condition of our Army in the 
West, and of affairs there. . . . We have some 
among us slow in action: if we could all intend 
our own ends less, and our ease too, our business 
in this army would go on wheels for expedition!" 
Cromwell was right. Manchester was weary 
of the struggle, and, worse still, he doubted his 

85 



Oliver Cromwell 

own cause. "If we beat the King ninety-and- 
nine times, yet he is King still, and so will his 
posterity be after him; but if the King beat us 
once we shall all be hanged and our posterity 
made slaves." 

If these words were repeated to Charles they 
must have cheered him with the prospect of 
once more returning to his capital. He decided 
to march on London. For the second time in 
the Civil War, Newbury in Berkshire was the 
scene of an engagement. Here he met the 
Roundheads out to bar his progress, and an 
indecisive battle took place. The King re- 
treated without loss and Manchester refused to 
ride in pursuit. Such indifference was but fuel 
to the flame of Cromwell's indignation with his 
chief. They had additional cause for quarrel 
in their religious differences, for Manchester 
was a leading Presbyterian and Cromwell was 
gradually becoming the representative In- 
dependent. He knew that if peace were to be 
restored to the distracted country complete 
success in arms was essential. 

On November 25, 1644, he openly attacked 
Manchester in the House of Commons, bringing 
against him the black charge that he had always 
been indisposed and backward to engagements 
and the ending of the war by the sword, and 
always "for such a Peace as a thorough victory 

86 



Naseby 

would be a disadvantage to." He accused him, 
too, of giving the enemy every advantage. 
Manchester defended himself in the House of 
Lords and replied by a counter-charge against 
Cromwell. It was reported that he had said 
"there would never be a good time in England 
till we had done with the Lords," and that he 
had expressed his contempt for the monarch by 
declaring that if he met him in battle he would 
as willingly fire at him as at any other man. 
Then, too, he had spoken disparagingly of the 
Scots, and the sensitive national pride had been 
wounded. The Scottish commissioners even 
proposed drastic measures of retaliation and 
held a meeting at Essex House to discuss the 
matter. "You ken vary weele," said their 
spokesman, "that Lieutenant-General Crom- 
well is no friend of ours, and since the advance 
of our army into England, he hath used all 
underhand and cunning means to take off from 
our honour and merit of this kingdom. . . . You 
ken vary weele the accord 'twixt the twa 
kingdoms, and the union by the Solemn League 
and Covenant, and if any be an Incendiary 
between the twa nations how he is to be pro- 
ceeded against." It was, however, decided to 
await further developments in Cromwell's career, 
since he was 'a gentleman of quick and subtle 
parts' and not without friends in both Houses. 

87 



Oliver Cromwell 

Cromwell delivered a stirring speech in the 
House of Commons on December 9. "It is 
now time to speak," he said, "or forever hold 
the tongue. The important occasion now is 
no less than to save a nation, out of a bleeding 
nay almost dying condition: which the long 
continuance of the war hath already brought it 
into." He saw clearly that unless the war were 
speedily brought to an end people would hate 
the very name of Parliament and would enforce 
a dishonourable peace. What were they say- 
ing even now? "That the Members of both 
Houses have got great places and commands, 
and the sword into their hands ; and, what by in- 
terest in Parliament, what by power in the Army, 
will perpetually continue themselves in grandeur, 
and not permit the war speedily to end, lest 
their own power should determine with it." 

What was the remedy? A Self -Denying 
Ordinance by which the members of both 
Houses should resign all military command 
until the end of the war. This passed through 
the House of Commons but was unfavourably 
received by the Upper House, since from earliest 
times the lords had been leaders in warfare. 
A more drastic measure still was now proposed 
— the entire reconstruction of the Army on the 
lines of Cromwell's Ironsides. The New Model 
Army was to consist of 22,000 men (14,400 foot 

88 



Naseby 

and 7600 horse and dragoons) ; the soldiers were 
to receive regular pay and to be used in any 
part of the country where they were required. 
It had been found that troops raised for the 
purpose of protecting one county or group of 
counties could scarcely be induced to leave 
their own neighbourhood. Sir Thomas Fairfax 
was placed in chief command, Skippon was 
appointed Major-General in place of Man- 
chester, and the office of Lieutenant-General 
was left open for the time being. 

Whether Cromwell expected to resign his com- 
mission or not is one of the secrets of history. 
One thing is certain — he did not do it. The Self- 
Denying Ordinance was no sooner passed than 
he was summoned to action once more and 
granted leave of absence from Parliament for 
forty days. At the end of that time the limit 
was extended and Fairfax signified his desire to 
appoint Cromwell to the vacant command. 

The New Model Army was to turn the tide 
in the affairs of the Roundheads. From this 
time onward the Army and not the Parliament 
was the leading spirit in the Revolution. 
Cromwell, with a body of 600 horse and 
dragoons, joined his chief at Guilsborough; 
drums were beaten and trumpets sounded as the 
army welcomed each contingent at the rendez- 
vous. All was in readiness for an instant 

89 



Oliver Cromwell 

march, and the following day the army set out 
in pursuit of the King, who had left Oxford 
with 5000 cavalry and about the same number 
of foot soldiers. In the early morning of 
June 14, 1645, the Royalists discerned the 
Parliamentary army cresting the hills round 
Naseby. Hopes were high on both sides and 
Cromwell was in the best of spirits. "When 
I saw the enemy draw up and march in gallant 
order toward us, and we a company of poor 
ignorant men, to seek how to order our battle 
— the General having commanded me to order 
all the horse — I could not, riding alone about my 
business, but smile out to God in praises, in assu- 
rance of victory, because God would, by things 
that are not, bring to naught things that are." 
The chances were about equal. In numbers 
the Parliamentarians had the best of it, in 
experience the Royalists. The army was ar- 
ranged in the same fashion as at Marston, with 
cavalry on each side and infantry in the centre. 
Skippon commanded the centre of the Parlia- 
mentary army, Ireton the left wing, and 
Cromwell the right. On the King's side Astley 
commanded the centre, with Rupert in charge of 
the left wing, and Langdale of the right. To the 
cry of "God our Strength!" Cromwell opened 
the battle by a successful charge and drove the 
enemy before him. Ireton's wing was broken 

90 



Naseby 

by Rupert, and he himself was wounded and 
taken prisoner. Skippon was sore beset and 
severely wounded, and the Cavaliers were in a 
fair way to victory. But Cromwell repeated 
the tactics that had won him fame at Marston, 
and swooped round to attack the Royalist 
centre in front and rear. 

They are here! They rush on! We are broken! We 
are gone! 

Our left is borne before them like stubble on the blast. 

O Lord put forth thy might. O Lord defend the 
right ! 

Stand back to back, in God's name, and fight it to the 
last. 

Stout Skippon hath a wound; the centre hath given 
ground, 

Hark! Hark! what means the trampling of horse- 
men on our rear? 

Whose banner do I see, boys ? 'Tis he, thank God, 
'tis he, boys! 

Bear up another minute : brave Oliver is here ! l 

The Cavaliers, though hard pressed on all 
sides, held on unflinchingly in face of sure 
defeat. The King, at the head of his Guards, 
commanded: "One charge more, gentlemen, 
and the day is ours!" But the charge was 
never given. "Would you go to your death?" 
asked an officer who led him from the field. 
The Cavaliers fled, pursued for fourteen miles by 
the victors. The spoils of war included, besides 

1 Lord Macaulay, The Battle of Naseby. 
9i 



Oliver Cromwell 

five thousand prisoners, the King's baggage 
and artillery, together with a haul of his private 
papers, which were to prove invaluable as evi- 
dence of his duplicity. He himself was a fugitive. 

Naseby practically ended the first Civil War, 
though there was still work to do in the South 
in stamping out the Royalists and taking 
isolated strongholds. One of the most brilliant 
feats in Cromwell's military career was the 
taking of Basing House, fortified as a garrison 
for the King, and of great importance because it 
lay on the main road from London to the West. 
It had been besieged off and on during the last 
two years, but had withstood all attack until, 
four months after Naseby, Cromwell took it by 
storm in six days. The fine old fortress, some 
two or three hundred years old, was razed to 
the ground. Lathom House, gallantly de- 
fended for over two years by the Countess of 
Derby, who valued her honour beyond her peace 
of mind, was now obliged to capitulate. 

With the capture of Bristol the West was se- 
cured for Parliament. The daring, headstrong, 
impetuous Rupert, the most brilliant officer on 
the King's side, fought for him no more — though 
later on he fought for the King's son. His career 
in England was at an end, and he and his brother 
Maurice were allowed to ship overseas. 



92 



CHAPTER XII: Parliament 
and the Army 

WHO was to be master of England? — • 
the Presbyterian Parliament, the 
Independent Army, the Episco- 
palian King? From henceforth Parliament 
and the Army no longer worked harmoniously 
together — they were rivals, and in their discord 
the King saw his best chance of coming into 
his own. 

But for the moment the Royalist cause was 
in sore straits. When Cromwell was occupied 
with the storming of Basing, Charles was await- 
ing events at Newark. He soon, however, left 
that town for the safer refuge of the Isle of Man. 
He returned to Oxford in November, still unable 
to think out any course, vainly hoping to 
obtain help from abroad and to rally an army 
once more to his standard. At the same time 
he was negotiating with the Scots, with Parlia- 
ment, and the Army. His love of intrigue and 
his inability to keep faith with one party or 
another were a direct cause of his downfall. 
He decided that his best course for the present 
was to place himself in the hands of the 
Scots, and he joined the Scottish army at 
Southwell, May 5, 1646. It was a fateful and 

93 



Oliver Cromwell 

fatal step on his part. He was badly treated 
— "barbarously," so he said — and he was virtu- 
ally a prisoner. 

A week or so before this Cromwell, whose 
work in the field was over for the time, returned 
to London. He took lodgings in Drury Lane, 
then a fashionable part of the town, and was 
thus within easy walking or riding distance of 
Westminster. He attended the House and had 
the satisfaction of being publicly thanked for 
his services in the war. It was also arranged 
that, should terms be made with the King, 
Fairfax and Cromwell should be raised to the 
peerage with substantial yearly grants in pay- 
ment of their services. Cromwell had not so 
far enriched himself by his exertions — rather 
the reverse. He had subscribed generously 
toward the cost of putting down the rebellion 
in Ireland, and he had had besides heavy 
personal expenses. He was now voted an 
income of £500 a year. 

The mass of the people was weary of the 
struggle and longed for a peaceable settlement. 
They wanted to attend to their farms and 
fields, their shops and counting-houses, to 
marry and give in marriage, to resume without 
shocks and alarms the pleasant intercourse of 
daily life. When the country was in a state of 
such unrest few brides and bridegrooms plighted 

94! 



Parliament and the Army 

their troth at the altar — yet two of Cromwell's 
daughters had not been too greatly over- 
burdened with anxiety to fall in love. Bridget, 
a girl of one and twenty, now the eldest of 
the family since Robert and Oliver were dead, 
was betrothed to Henry Ireton, her father's 
right-hand man, 'able with his pen and his 
sword,' who had made his reputation in the 
war in spite of his bad luck at Naseby. 
She was her father's daughter in the serious- 
ness of her outlook on life and the deeply 
religious cast of her mind — a fitting mate 
for the uncompromising Republican who was 
some twelve years her senior. Her sister 
Elizabeth was a joyous, thoughtless girl, 
only sixteen at the time of her marriage 
to Mr Claypole, a youth of a good family 
in Northamptonshire. Cromwell's enemies 
often charged him with ambition and a 
desire to exalt himself above his fellows, 
but in assenting to the unions of his children 
these qualities are not shown, for they married 
into the class to which they had always 
belonged. 

A few months after the wedding Cromwell 
wrote to Bridget a letter characteristic of his 
religious convictions. Few notes to his family 
are extant and probably he corresponded little, 
preoccupied as he was with public affairs. 

95 



Oliver Cromwell 

Nevertheless, family love was a strong trait in 
his character. The letter is as follows: 



"Dear Daughter, — I write not to thy 
Husband; partly to avoid trouble, for one line 
of mine begets many of his, which I doubt 
makes him sit up too late; partly because I 
am myself indisposed at this time, having some 
other considerations. 

"Your friends at Ely are well: your sister 
Claypole is, I trust in mercy, exercised with 
some perplexed thoughts. She sees her own 
vanity and carnal mind; bewailing it: she 
seeks after (as I hope also) what will satisfy. 
And thus to be a seeker is to be of the best sect 
next to a finder; and such an one shall every 
faithful humble seeker be at the end. Happy 
seeker, happy finder ! Who ever tasted that the 
Lord is gracious, without some sense of self, 
vanity, and badness? Who ever tasted that 
graciousness of His and could go less in desire 
— less than pressing after full enjoyment? 
Dear Heart, press on; let not husband, let not 
anything cool thy affections after Christ. I 
hope he will be an occasion to inflame them. 
That which is best worthy of love in thy Hus- 
band is that of the image of Christ he bears. 
Look on that, and love it best, and all the rest 
for that. I pray for thee and him; do so for me. 

96 



Parliament and the Army 

"My service and dear affections to the 
General and Generaless. I hear she is very 
kind to thee; it adds to all other obligations. 
"I am, Thy dear Father, 

"Oliver Cromwell." 

In the closing months of 1646 public affairs 
were in a state of chaos. Charles had reason 
bitterly to repent his surrender to the Scots, 
for they continually pressed him to sign the 
Solemn League and Covenant as the price of 
their support. He stubbornly refused, for he 
was ever loyal to his faith if not to his fellows. 
Parliament, though he was no less King of 
Scotland than King of England, had no inten- 
tion of allowing him to remain in the hands 
of his northern subjects. Negotiations were 
opened with him at Newcastle, where the 
Scottish army was now encamped, and he was 
asked to consent to drastic limitations of his 
power. He was not yet desperate — France 
might come to his aid — and he therefore gave 
an evasive reply. Parliament now negotiated 
with his custodians. They signified their will- 
ingness to return to their own country on pay- 
ment of their expenses (some £400,000) and 
to hand over the King, whose conversion to 
Presbyterianism was extremely remote, to the 
English commissioners. Scotland has been 

97 



Oliver Cromwell 

taunted with having sold her King, and though 
this is not exactly the case the monetary 
transaction has an unpleasant touch about it. 
The Scots were canny enough to want part 
of their money down before they packed their 
baggage, and Skippon was appointed to conduct 
the convoy of waggons, bearing bags and chests 
of gold, to be counted by the thrifty Scots at 
Newcastle ere the bargain was complete. With 
the clink of the last coin the English commis- 
sioners were free to escort the King south- 
ward once more. His journey was a royal 
progress and he was greeted with fervid 
loyalty by his subjects. Unfortunately for 
him, Charles overestimated the value of the 
enthusiasm displayed, and it had its after- 
effects in making a settlement with him impos- 
sible. Not far from the spot where he had 
first raised the standard at Nottingham he was 
met by Sir Thomas Fairfax, who kissed his 
hand and escorted him on horseback on the 
last stage of his journey to Holmby House in 
Northamptonshire. He was now in the hands 
of Parliament. What of the army? 

"We are full of faction and worse," Cromwell 
wrote to Fairfax, for there were all but in- 
superable difficulties to be faced on every side. 
Parliament, jealous of the army and aghast at 
the terrible expense of keeping up an armed 

98 



Parliament and the Army 

force, determined to disband half the infantry 
and to send out regiments to put down rebel- 
lion in Ireland. But they had reckoned without 
the soldiery, who were well aware that the 
defeat of the Royalist cause was due to their 
prowess in the field. The Irish expedition did 
not appeal to them, and only one in ten volun- 
teered to go. Then, too, they had other cause 
for rebellion, for their pay was months in 
arrear, and only meagre promises of payment 
were made. They also required assurance that 
none of their acts in the late war should be 
brought up against them. With the sword in 
their hands they had good authority to back 
them; if it were sheathed and they returned 
to their ploughshares, what hope was there 
in argument and remonstrance? They chose 
agents — called 'Agitators' — to represent their 
grievances to Parliament, and a letter was sent 
to Cromwell and Skippon urging their influence 
on behalf of the men they had so ably led to 
victory. Cromwell, with Ireton, Fleetwood, and 
Skippon, went down to Saffron Walden to in- 
vestigate their grievances and to promise them 
eight weeks' arrears of pay, with a guarantee 
for the balance due. 

Cromwell and the other officers finally decided 
to throw in their lot with the army. He had 
been expressly told that "if he would not forth- 

99 



Oliver Cromwell 

with come and head them, they would go their 
own way without him." His action averted 
another revolution. The officers were anxious to 
put themselves right with the City of London, 
and in a manifesto written from Royston, June 
1647, they stated: "We have said before and 
profess it now, we desire no alteration of the 
Civil Government. . . . We seek the good of 
all." They had cause for anxiety in that the 
City of London — Presbyterian to the backbone 
— was no less hostile to the military than was 
Parliament itself. Cromwell was beginning to 
pay the penalty of all public men in that he was 
now well hated by a faction. "It is a miserable 
thing," he wrote, "to serve a Parliament to 
which, let a man be never so faithful, if one 
pragmatical fellow amongst them rise and 
asperse him, he shall never wipe it off." He 
even had reason to fear arrest. 

He now resolved on a bold step : the King was 
the key to the situation and the King should 
be under the protection of the army. Cornet 
Joyce, a tailor by trade, was sent to Holmby, 
ostensibly to prevent Charles from being re- 
moved. Whether he was acting on Cromwell's 
suggestion or not is unknown, but he knew what 
he was about. With an escort of five hundred 
men he reached the castle at ten at night. 
Leaving them without, he burst into the King's 

IOO 



Parliament and the Army 

bedchamber and explained his errand. The 
following morning the King inquired by whose 
authority he was acting, and Joyce pointed to 
the troops in the courtyard. "As well written 
a commission and with as fine a frontispiece 
as I have ever seen in my life," remarked His 
Majesty, and he gladly rode forth in their 
company, hoping that a change of lodging 
might bring a change of luck. 

Parliament and the City were apprehensive 
at this evidence of the army's determination 
to take matters into its own hands. The 
alarm was increased by the fear that the army, 
which was constantly changing its head-quar- 
ters, should march on London and enforce the 
demands embodied in the 'Declaration of the 
Army.' One of these was that Parliament 
should fix a date for its dissolution, another 
that eleven members known to be hostile 
should be suspended for six months. The 
members in question prudently absented them- 
selves, but the City, incensed by this display of 
weakness, broke out into tumult. On July 26 
many young men and apprentices "came down 
to the House in a most rude and tumultuous 
manner; and presented some particular Desires 
— Desires that the eleven may come back." 

Tension was at its height when on August 3 
the army entered the town, but sober counsel 

IOI 



Oliver Cromwell 

prevailed and negotiations took place in the 
Earl of Holland's house in Kensington — that 
historic house which still stands. Parliament 
and the City submitted. 

Once more an attempt was made to come to 
terms with the King and he was asked to assent 
to the 'Heads of the Proposals,' a document 
drawn up by Ireton, which, though curtailing 
his power, was on the whole generous in its 
terms. Charles, upheld by the conviction of 
his own importance, refused. "You cannot do 
without me," he said; "you will fall to ruin if 
I do not sustain you." Unfortunately there 
was growing up in the country a party (known 
as the Levellers) which was fully prepared to 
do without him. In a document called 'The 
Agreement of the People' they proposed, as 
Cromwell said, "very great alterations of the 
government of the kingdom — alterations of that 
government it hath been under ever since it 
was a nation." While this was being hotly 
debated in Parliament — Cromwell himself was 
against it, for he thought it would bring 
the kingdom to desolation — the King escaped 
from Hampton Court. He was, however, only 
to find a drearier prison at Carisbrooke Castle 
in the Isle of Wight. 



I02 



CHAPTER XIII : The Fate of 
Charles Stuart 

THE King, now at his wits' end for his 
restoration, once more made terms 
with the Scots. He no longer doubted 
that the 'Solemn League and Covenant' was 
the be-all and end-all with them, just as his own 
faith was with him. Hence he promised to 
confirm it by Act of Parliament provided that 
he and his household might be exempt from 
signing it. This led to the short and sharp 
issue of the second Civil War. On April 11 the 
Scottish Parliament resolved that the treaty 
between the two kingdoms had been broken, 
and that England should be forced to establish 
Presbyterianism. 

To outward seeming the Royalist cause was 
once more in the ascendant, and insurrections 
had broken out in many parts of the country. 
Cromwell was sent to Wales to put down a 
rising there, Lambert marched to the North to 
intercept the Scottish army when it crossed 
the border, and Fairfax himself went to Essex 
and there laid siege to Colchester, which was 
held by the Royalists. At the beginning of the 
year Parliament, weary of negotiations that 
ended in nothing, had resolved by the vote on 

103 



Oliver Cromwell 

'No Addresses' that it would have no further 
parleying with the King. The hopelessness of 
any settlement with such an intriguer had 
converted Cromwell at length to this view, 
and henceforth he held that "Parliament 
should govern and defend the kingdom by their 
own power, and not teach the people any longer 
to expect safety and government from an ob- 
stinate man whose heart God hath hardened." 

He spent a couple of months in Wales, and 
the most important of his exploits was the 
siege of Pembroke Castle, which made a stub- 
born resistance and surrendered only through 
starvation. The besiegers were in little better 
plight, and were living for the most part on 
bread and water. 

Three days before this happened — that is, 
on July 8 — a Scottish army under the Marquis 
of Hamilton had crossed the border. Directly 
Cromwell's work in the West was accomplished 
he was free to go North and join forces with 
Major-General Lambert. It was a sorry army 
he brought with him, for his men were worn out 
with the ardours of the Welsh campaign and 
seemed fitter for a hospital than a battle-field. 
On August 12 he joined Lambert, and the 
combined Roundhead host of some 8000 was 
greatly outnumbered by the 21,000 under 
Hamilton. The enemy was marching South to 

104 



The Fate of Charles Stuart 

London, and Cromwell, whose one idea was to 
be up and at them, upon deliberate advice 
decided to put his army between them and 
Scotland, thus barring their passage North to 
seek reinforcements. He hastened on until he 
reached Preston, and here he first came on the 
enemy moving, almost strolling, southward in 
loose order. "We were about four miles from 
Preston, and thereupon we advanced with the 
whole army: the enemy being drawn out on a 
moor betwixt us and the town, the armies on 
both sides engaged; and after a very sharp 
dispute continuing for three or four hours, it 
pleased God to enable us to give them a defeat." 
The importance of this attack was that, though 
it still left Hamilton the advantage in numbers, 
it cut the Scottish army in two; one detach- 
ment then moved North and the other South, 
to be pursued and taken by the Roundheads 
in a series of sharp conflicts in the course of 
the two following days, during which time it 
was 'one long chase and carnage.' Cromwell 
pursued the northern detachment and a serious 
engagement took place near Wigan. "They 
drew off again and recovered Wigan before we 
could attempt anything upon them. We lay 
that night in the field close by them, being very 
dirty and weary, and having marched twelve 
miles on such ground as I never rode in all my 

105 



Oliver Cromwell 

life, the day being very wet. . . . We could 
not engage the enemy until we came within 
three miles of Warrington." Here the Scottish 
force was badly beaten. Among the mortally 
wounded on the other side was Colonel Thorn- 
haugh, to whom in her Memoirs, Mrs Hutchinson 
pays tribute when she declares that "a man of 
greater courage and integrity fell not, nor 
fought not, in this glorious cause." 

Ten thousand prisoners were taken, but the 
loss in dead and wounded was not estimated. 
Hamilton was among the fugitives, but he 
was caught and the following year paid penalty 
on the scaffold. The Scottish army was no 
more. 

The victory of Preston disheartened the 
besieged in Colchester and the garrison surren- 
dered. Two of the leaders, Sir Charles Lucas 
and Sir George Lisle, gave themselves up to 
mercy and were shot. Such is war. 

Cromwell remained in the North to take 
Berwick and Carlisle, and he crossed the Tweed 
to impress Scotland with the fact that he 
believed the soldiery sent forth to fight were 
innocent of any interest in the matter. 

Colonel Hammond, the King's gaoler at 
Carisbrooke, became most disheartened at the 
course of affairs and wrote on this subject to 
Cromwell. His letter in reply is one of the 

106 



The Fate of Charles Stuart 

most remarkable that has come down to us, 
for it is full of tenderness, and breathes in 
every line his inalienable trust in God. "Let 
us look into Providences," he said; "surely 
they mean somewhat. They hang so together, 
have been so constant, so clear, unclouded." 

By the time that young Colonel Hammond 
received this missive his august prisoner was no 
longer in his custody, for the heads of the army, 
resolving to keep him in even closer captivity, 
had taken him to Hurst Castle, a desolate build- 
ing on the Hampshire coast. "You could not 
have chosen a worse," murmured the monarch 
with foreboding when told of his destination. 

With the laurels of victory green on his brow 
Cromwell returned to London. Here events had 
been progressing with lightning speed. The 
decision to have no further intercourse with the 
King had been overruled, and Parliament re- 
opened negotiations with him in September. 

The history of the next few weeks might be 
told in a series of glaring headlines, for every 
day had a fresh sensation. The army, indignant 
at Parliament's attempt at a settlement with 
Charles, was for drastic action. Once more it 
had shed its blood — only to find the settle- 
ment of the country as far off as ever. Any 
agreement between the Presbyterians and the 
Royalists would mean it had been shed in vain, 

107 



Oliver Cromwell 

and the independence of its religious faith would 
be at stake. Strafford and Laud had paid the 
penalty of the country's misgovernment with 
their lives; the third victim had yet to come 
to judgment. What had been whispered in 
corners was now to be proclaimed on the house- 
tops. The resolution was put into words in 
a meeting of the army held at Windsor: "If 
ever the Lord brought us back again in peace, 
to call Charles Stuart, the man of blood, to 
an account for the blood he had shed against 
the Lord's cause and the people in these 
poor nations." In the ' Remonstrance of the 
Army,' drawn up by Ireton, his trial and 
execution were demanded. The Remonstrance 
was laid before the House, but it was set aside, 
and by the decision of the majority further 
negotiations were opened with the King. The 
leaders of the army now determined on drastic 
action. To dissolve Parliament at such a mo- 
ment was impossible, but it could be purged of 
Presbyterians. "We shall know," said Vane, 
"who is on the side of the King and who on 
the side of the people." 

The army marched to London, and at seven 
in the morning on December 6, Colonel Pride 
with a regiment of soldiers reached Westminster. 
He held in his hand a list of offending members 
who were to be barred entrance. 

108 



The Fate of Charles Stuart 

"By what right do you act?" one asked. 

"By the right of the sword," was the reply. 

In all one hundred and forty members were 
expelled, and some of them were lodged for 
the night in a tavern with the ominous sign- 
post of Hell. From that time forward the Long 
Parliament ceased to exist in all but name. 
Cromwell, though he was not a party to this 
act of military despotism, yet approved of it. 

The 'Rump,' as this mutilated assembly 
was afterward called, now proceeded to busi- 
ness, and nominated one hundred and thirty- 
five commissioners to try the King for treason 
in that he had levied war against Parliament. 
The House of Lords rejected the Bill, and the 
Commons therefore decided to dispense with 
their approval. "The people," they asserted, 
"are, under God, the original of all just power." 
Unfortunately for the relevance of this asser- 
tion, the assembly was in no way representative 
of the people. 

Half of the appointed commissioners refused 
to take part or lot in the trial of the King — 
among these were Fairfax, whose wife dissuaded 
him, Vane, the friend of Milton, a man of high 
intellectual powers, a pure patriot if ever there 
was one, and Algernon Sidney, who declared that 
"the King could be tried by no court, and that 
by such a court as that no man could be tried." 

109 



Oliver Cromwell 

Cromwell interrupted him in anger: "I tell 
you," he said, "we will cut off his head with the 
crown upon it." 

"I cannot stop you," replied Sidney, "but 
I will keep myself clean from having any hand 
in this business." 

Charles had been removed from Hurst Castle 
to Windsor and thence to St James's to await 
events. His trial was practically a court- 
martial, and such courts, by a curious irony of 
fate, had been expressly condemned by the 
Petition of Right. 

All was now ready for the last act but one of 
the tragedy of Charles I. The commissioners, 
seated in the Painted Chamber, were discussing 
the final stages of procedure on the morning of 
January 20, 1649, when a messenger brought 
tidings that the King was disembarking at the 
river-side. Cromwell rushed to the window and 
it was noticed that he had turned deathly pale 
as he gazed for a moment without. Then, 
facing his colleagues, his harsh voice scarcely 
under control, he cried: "My masters, he is 
come, he is come, and now we are doing that 
great work that the whole nation will be full of. 
Therefore I desire you to resolve here what 
answer we shall give the King when he comes 
before us, for the first question he will ask us 
will be by what authority and commission do 

no 




MY MASTERS, HE IS COME, HE IS COME 



The Fate of Charles Stuart 

we try him?" After a moment's silence one 
of the members replied: "In the name of the 
Commons in Parliament assembled and all the 
good people of England." 

That same afternoon Westminster Hall was 
the stage of the most significant scene in our 
constitutional history. At one end a plat- 
form had been erected, and here, tier above 
tier, sat the King's accusers, Cromwell among 
them. Serjeant Bradshaw, a shrewd lawyer 
who had been chosen President, was the central 
figure. Charles sat, his head covered, facing 
his judges, his back to the throng of spectators. 
As he listened, seemingly indifferent, to the 
indictment, his mind must have wandered back 
to that scene which took place eight years 
earlier, when he had abandoned his friend in 
like peril of death. He denied the authority of 
the court and refused to plead since a king 
could be tried by no earthly tribunal. He 
stood, he said, for the freedom and liberty of 
the people of England. The proceedings were 
constantly interrupted by the audience who, 
beside themselves with excitement, were shout- 
ing each other down with cries of "Justice!" 
and "God save your Majesty!" After five 
days' trial the King was condemned to death, 
and the second to sign the warrant was Oliver 
Cromwell. Such was his conviction that 

in 



Oliver Cromwell 

Charles must die that it is said he held the 
pen and forced the hand of one commissioner 
who showed hesitation in appending his signa- 
ture to the parchment. 

On the day appointed for his execution the 
King left St James's Palace at ten in the morn- 
ing, with Colonel Tomlinson and an escort of 
foot for his guard, Bishop Juxon for his consoler, 
and friends to bear him company. On reaching 
Whitehall he was offered refreshment, but he 
refused all but a glass of wine and a piece of 
bread. As the clock struck twelve he was 
brought through the Banqueting Hall to the 
scaffold draped with black. There lay the axe 
and block, and there stood two masked execu- 
tioners. He addressed a few words to those 
around him, since his voice could not carry to 
the thronging multitude below: 

"For the people I desire their liberty and 
freedom as much as anybody whomsoever. 
... If I would have given way to have all 
changed according to the power of the sword, 
I needed not to have come here; and there- 
fore I tell you (and I pray God it be not laid to 
your charge) that I am a martyr of the people." 

His last words, as recorded in the old chronicle, 
were with Dr Juxon. 

The King: "I have a good cause and a 
gracious God on my side." 

112 



The Fate of Charles Stuart 

Dr Juxon: "There is but one stage more, 
this stage is turbulent and troublesome; it is 
a short one, but you may consider it will soon 
carry you a very great way, it will carry you 
from Earth to Heaven, and there you shall find 
a great deal of cordial joy and comfort." 

The King: "I go from a corruptible to an 
incorruptible crown where no disturbance can 
be." 

Dr Juxon: "You are exchanged from a 
temporal to an eternal crown, a good exchange." 

The King arranged his hair under his cap, 
presented his order of the Knight of the Garter 
to the Bishop, murmured "Remember," and 
knelt at the block, bowing his head in prayer. 
A moment later he gave the signal. With one 
blow the head was severed, and the weeping 
multitude groaned in pity as it was held up 
to their view. 

That night, as the coffined body lay in 
Whitehall, Cromwell stood and gazed upon the 
features of the man against whom he had fought 
so well. "The King was a goodly man and 
might have lived for many years," he murmured. 
Then, taking a last farewell, he was heard to 
mutter: "Stern necessity!" 



"3 



CHAPTER XIV: The Com- 
monwealth 

THE King is dead ! From Cheapside and 
at the appointed places the trumpets 
blare forth and the heralds announce: 
"Whoever shall proclaim a new King Charles 
the Second or another, without authority of 
Parliament in this nation, shall be a traitor and 
suffer death." 

A week later the House of Commons was at 
work with a Bill to abolish the House of Lords 
and the kingship. England was to be a Com- 
monwealth, governed by "the supreme autho- 
rity of this nation, the representatives of this 
people in Parliament." A council of state, con- 
sisting of forty-one members, was nominated, 
with Bradshaw as President, Cromwell and 
Fairfax among its members, and John Milton as 
secretary for foreign tongues. Writs were to 
run "in the name of the Keepers of the Liber- 
ties of England." The royal seal was broken up 
and the seal of the Commonwealth was struck, 
bearing on one side the arms of England and 
Scotland and on the other a representation of 
the House of Commons. 

As a precaution against Royalist devotion it 
was ordered that all statues of the late King 

114 



The Commonwealth 

should be removed. Not content with this the 
statue at the Royal Exchange was replaced by 
an inscription, Exit Tyrannus Regum Ultimus, 
dated "the first year of freedom by God's bless- 
ing restored." The following year Henrietta 
Maria's statue in Great Queen Street — the high- 
way named after her — was broken up. 

Scotland in the meantime had asserted her 
independence by proclaiming Charles II King 
of Great Britain, France, and Ireland. The 
Duke of Ormond upheld the Royalist banner 
in Ireland, and assured Charles that, should he 
land there, he would be welcomed by three- 
quarters of the population. 

Cromwell was not so entirely immersed in 
public affairs as to be unmindful of his family. 
A couple of days after the King's execution he 
was to be found corresponding about the be- 
trothal of his idle son Richard to Dorothy 
Mayor. Cromwell had no delusions as to his 
son's capabilities or character, and he was 
anxious that his future bride should be a lady 
of good disposition rather than that she should 
be of noble birth. Dorothy Mayor satisfied his 
expectations, and in a letter to his "very loving 
friend," Mr Robinson, preacher at Southamp- 
ton, he wrote: "Upon your testimony of the 
Gentlewoman's worth, and the common report 
of the piety of the family, I shall be willing to 

"5 



Oliver Cromwell 

entertain the renewing of the motion, upon 
such conditions as may be to mutual satisfac- 
tion." 

A few weeks later he wrote to the lady's 
father — "My very worthy friend Richard 
Mayor Esquire" — thanking him for the kind 
reception given to his son "in the liberty given 
him to wait upon your worthy daughter, the 
report of whose virtue and godliness has so 
great a place in my heart, that I think fit not to 
neglect anything on my part which may con- 
summate a close of the business if God please to 
dispose the young ones' hearts thereunto." The 
"young ones' " hearts were in the right place, 
but a difference arose between the two fathers 
as to the marriage portion. Cromwell was 
unable to give his son the income derived from 
a very large share of the estate. 

"I have two young daughters to bestow, if 
God give them life and opportunity. Accord- 
ing to your offer, I have nothing for them; 
nothing at all in hand. If my son die, what 
consideration is there to me? And yet a 
jointure parted with 'on my side.' If she die, 
there is 'on your side' little money parted 
with." 

Such were the business-like methods of seven- 
teenth-century parents in discussing their chil- 
dren's unions! The lovers, happy in their 

116 



The Commonwealth 

courtship, might at any time be parted by a 
parental decree. Both fathers meant to have 
their own way. "What you demand of me," 
Cromwell wrote again, "is very high in all 
points. I am willing to settle as you desire 
in everything: saving for maintenance £400 
per annum, £300 per annum." 

At last all negotiations were concluded. 
Richard Cromwell and Dorothy Mayor were 
married and settled down to an idyllic life in 
the country. 

Cromwell's story once more is woven into the 
web of history. The young Commonwealth 
was beset with difficulties without and within. 
His first task was to subjugate Ireland, hot 
with unrest, a valuable recruiting ground for 
Royalism, a home of Roman Catholicism. 

The Protestant settlement of Ulster in 
James I's reign had been affected by the 
dispossession of the native Irish, who from 
time immemorial had lived on the land, and 
by the making of grants of their estates to 
Englishmen. Every kind of legal quibble, 
every unfair advantage, had been taken to 
effect this displacement. Bitter hatred of the 
usurpers was the result. Strafford had ruled 
Ireland with an iron hand — he was a tyrant 
but allowed no lesser tyrants to hold sway 
— and when he was recalled in 1639 the 

117 



Oliver Cromwell 

seething discontent in the country broke out 
into revolt. This led in 1641 to the terrible 
massacre of the Ulster Protestants. To avenge 
this massacre and to restore order in Ireland 
was the first task of the new Government. 

Before Cromwell started on his new campaign 
there was trouble with the army at home. 
The soldiers to see service in Ireland were 
chosen by a curious ceremony in Whitehall. 
Fourteen regiments forgathered there, and, 
after a prayer had been offered up, fourteen 
slips of paper were cut, seven bearing the word 
'Ireland,' seven blank. A child was called in to 
draw the lots and to present the strips to the 
officers commanding the regiments, thus ensur- 
ing, so they fully believed, that "the whole 
disposition thereof was of the Lord." The 
officers accepted their commands, but the men 
of a more worldly frame of mind were unwilling 
to risk their lives once more until arrears had 
been paid. Mutiny broke out in London, and 
one of the ringleaders was shot in St Paul's 
Churchyard as a warning to others. His 
friends gave him a public funeral and it was 
attended by a great concourse of people. It was 
an ill omen for the authority of the Common- 
wealth. 

The changes and chances of this mortal life, 
greater than ever in such a time of transition, 

118 



The Commonwealth 

had made men's minds ferment with half- 
digested ideas. This was nowhere more appa- 
rent than among the fighting men. The Level- 
lers, led by one Everard, an ex-soldier inspired 
by a vision, believed that the "time of deliver- 
ance was at hand; and God would bring his 
people out of this slavery, and restore them to 
their freedom in enjoying the fruits and benefits 
of the Earth." With this in view they appro- 
priated some common land at St George's 
Hill in Surrey, began to dig the ground and sow 
roots and beans, inviting any who wished to do 
so to work with them, with the full assurance 
of meat, drink, clothes, and no money. When 
they were brought before Cromwell they refused 
to uncover their heads because he was but their 
fellow-creature. In this and in other ways 
their religion was the germ of Quakerism, a 
sect which was to be founded a few years later 
by George Fox. 

The Levellers were outdone in extravagance 
by a new sect which had arisen — the Fifth 
Monarchy men. The four monarchies of old 
Assyria, Persia, Greece, and Rome had passed 
away, and the time was now ripe for the 
coming of the Fifth Monarchy — that of Christ 
on earth. All ordinary forms of government 
were to be abolished and the saints were to rule. 

The leader of the Levellers was John Lilburn, 
119 



Oliver Cromwell 

whom Cromwell had championed in early Parlia- 
mentary days, and who was now to be his 
remorseless critic and opponent. Lilburn was 
very popular and his influence quickly spread. 
Open mutiny broke out in the provinces 
among the soldiers, who held these new prin- 
ciples. Something was to be done instantly. 
Cromwell knew no half -measures. "I tell 
you," he said in the Council, "y° u have no 
other way to deal with these men but to break 
them in pieces or they will break us." Accom- 
panied by Fairfax he marched at top speed to 
Salisbury. The rebels, hearing of his approach, 
had pressed on to Burford in Oxfordshire, and, 
being very weary, had gone to bed. Cromwell 
and Fairfax, after a march of nearly fifty miles, 
reached the town as the clocks were striking 
midnight. A shot or two and the mutiny was 
quashed! The ringleaders were captured; 
three of them were executed in Burford 
churchyard in the morning; a fourth, who 
expressed penitence, was pardoned. Cromwell, 
by way of emphasizing the lesson, entered the 
church and addressed the men with such 
eloquence that they wept. Levellers and Fifth 
Monarchy men were sufficiently discomfited to be 
aware that the times were not yet ripe either 
for a return to the simplicity of the Garden of 
Eden or for the second coming of Christ. 

I20 



The Commonwealth 

There was no further delay in recruiting for 
the Irish campaign. On July 10, 1649, Crom- 
well left London, travelling in almost royal 
state in a coach drawn by six noble Flanders 
horses, accompanied by many carriages, with 
an escort of eighty Life-guardsmen, all of them 
men of breeding. Passing through Windsor the 
cavalcade reached Bristol. Several of Crom- 
well's letters to his friends are dated from this 
town, and among them is one to Richard Mayor, 
who had the opportunity of being the wise 
counsellor to Richard Cromwell, a position 
which the father would have filled in times of 
peace. The father knows the son's weakness, 
and is troubled by his feeble, irresolute nature: 
"I am very glad to hear of your welfare, 
and that our children have so good leisure to 
make a journey and to eat cherries — it is very 
excusable in my daughter: I hope she may have 
a very good pretence for it! I assure you, Sir, 
I wish her very well; and I believe she knows it. 
I pray you tell her from me, I expect she w T rites 
often to me; by which I shall understand how 
all your family doth, and she will be kept in 
some exercise. I have delivered my son up to 
you; and I hope you will counsel him; he will 
need it, and indeed I believe he likes well what 
you say, and will be advised by you. I wish he 
may be serious, the times require it." 

121 



Oliver Cromwell 

Once again he wrote to the same corre- 
spondent when "Aboard the John" at Milford 
Haven, announcing to him the good news re- 
ceived from Ireland, where Lieutenant-General 
Jones, who had been sent in advance, had 
gained an important victory over Ormond out- 
side Dublin. It was, he said, "an astonishing 
mercy so great and seasonable that indeed we 
are like them that dreamed." He then reverted 
once more to private affairs and his deep 
concern for his son: "I envy him not his 
contents; but I fear he should be swallowed 
up in them. I would have him mind and 
understand business, read a little history, study 
the mathematics and cosmography: these are 
good, with subordination to the things of God. 
Better than idleness or mere outward worldly 
contents. These fit for public services for 
which a man is born." 

To Richard in person he did not write, but 
by the same messenger he sent a letter of tender 
solicitude to his daughter-in-law. "I desire 
you both to make it above all things your 
business to seek the Lord: to be frequently 
calling upon Him that He would manifest Him- 
self to you in His Son; and be listening what 
returns He makes to you, for He will be 
speaking in your ear and in your heart, if 
you attend thereunto. As for the pleasures 

122 



The Commonwealth 

of this life, and outward business let that 
upon the bye." 

For the next few months Cromwell had no 
call for tenderness. He went to Ireland as 
an avenger of the Protestant massacre, as a 
General of the Commonwealth intent on the 
recognition of the new government at the 
point of the sword. 

He landed on August 15 with some 9000 
men in 100 ships, and was received with enthu- 
siasm in Dublin, where great guns boomed his 
welcome. He addressed the cheering crowds 
from his coach, speaking of the great work in 
front of him — stern vengeance to be followed by 
the peaceful settlement of the country. He 
also issued a proclamation forbidding the 
soldiery to rob and pillage the country people 
unless in arms. After giving his men a fort- 
night's rest he set out for Drogheda, into which 
town Ormond had thrown 3000 troops, English, 
Royalists, and Irish Catholics, the flower of 
his army. On September 3 — a day to be ever 
memorable in Cromwell's life — he reached the 
town and summoned it to surrender. The 
governor refused. The following day the 
storm began. Twice the Cromwellian soldiers 
were hurled back, but, leaping once more into 
the breach, they broke, with the fury of battle 
on them, into the town. The governor stood 

123 



Oliver Cromwell 

at bay on the Mill Mount with a human 
palisade of 300 men. He was persuaded to 
disarm, but this did not save his soldiers, who 
were all put to the sword. Worse was 
to follow. Cromwell gave orders that there 
should be no quarter. "Being in the heat of 
action I forbade them to spare any that were in 
arms in the town; and, I think, that night they 
put to the sword about 2000 men; divers of the 
officers and soldiers being fled over the bridge 
into the other (the northern) part of the town, 
where about a hundred of them possessed 
St Peter's Church steeple, some of the west 
gate, and others a strong round tower next 
the gate called St Sunday's. These being sum- 
moned to yield to mercy, refused. Whereupon 
I ordered the steeple of St Peter's Church to be 
fired, when one of them was heard to say in 
the midst of the flames: 'God damn me, God 
confound me; I burn, I burn.' " 

The following day two other towers surren- 
dered. One showed fight but was compelled 
to submit. As a punishment the officers were 
knocked on the head and a tenth of the soldiery 
were put to death. The remainder, with 
the garrison from the second tower, were 
taken prisoner and shipped to Barbados. To 
Cromwell it was retribution: "It is remark- 
able that these people, at the first, set up the 

124 



The Commonwealth 

Mass in some places of the town that had been 
monasteries; but afterward grew so insolent 
that, the last Lord's Day before the storm, the 
Protestants were thrust out of the great church 
called St Peter's, and they had public Mass 
there: and in this very place near 1000 of 
them were put to the sword, fleeing thither for 
safety. I believe all their friars were knocked 
on the head promiscuously but two." 

Such was Cromwell's vengeance. He never 
felt remorse. It was the righteous judgment 
of God for past misdeeds and necessary to 
prevent future bloodshed. Historians have 
differed in their verdict upon it. Carlyle has 
justified this barbarous revenge for a barbarous 
massacre, but even in war time "an eye for an 
eye and a tooth for a tooth" is hardly accept- 
able as an interpretation of God's will. 

The massacre justified itself in this at least, 
that the news spread like wildfire and struck 
terror into Irish hearts. Trim and Dundalk 
were abandoned, Ross opened its gates. In 
September we find Cromwell at Wexford, a 
strongly garrisoned town with two thousand 
men and a hundred cannon, protected on the 
water side by a couple of well-armed ships. 
The sack of Wexford was but a repetition of the 
sack of Drogheda. Cromwell opened negotia- 
tions with the governor and assured him that, 

125 



Oliver Cromwell 

should he refuse to surrender, he would be 
guilty of shedding innocent blood. The gover- 
nor wrote spirited replies, and said that he 
would make no conditions but such as were 
honourable to himself and his party. Cromwell 
would not consent to terms, and the governor 
wrote once more: "I leave you to your better 
judgment, and myself to the assistance of the 
Almighty." 

In order to bring matters to a crisis Cromwell 
decided to concentrate his attention on the 
taking of Wexford Castle. The castle was ulti- 
mately betrayed by a traitor within the walls, 
and the Irish garrison withdrew into the town, 
hotly pursued by the Cromwellians, who "ran 
violently upon the town with their leaders and 
stormed it. And when they were come into 
the market-place, the enemy making a stiff 
resistance, our forces brake them; and then 
put all to the sword that came in their way. 
Two boatfuls of the enemy, attempting to 
escape, being overprest with numbers, sank; 
whereby were drowned near three hundred of 
them. I believe, in all, there was lost of the 
enemy not many less than two thousand; and 
I believe not twenty of yours from first to last 
of the siege." The soldiers rejoiced in excellent 
booty, such as iron, hides, tallow, salt, pine, 
and barrel-staves — somewhat heavy merchandise 

126 



The Commonwealth 

that would require either immediate purchase 
or a special vessel to convey it to the English 
ports. 

Hostilities were suspended for a short time 
and the army went into winter quarters. Many 
of the troops fell ill with dysentery and Cromwell 
himself was laid up with ague. When the army 
took the field again town after town in central 
Ireland was taken. Clonmel was captured 
after a stiff fight and heavy loss to the Common- 
wealth army; Waterford still held out, and 
Cromwell was not able to remain to complete 
his work of subjugation. Danger was threaten- 
ing the Commonwealth from Scotland, and he 
was recalled to England. Ireton remained 
behind as Deputy-Lieutenant. 

Two years were to pass before Ireland was 
finally crushed. Cromwell's fatal policy for 
the unhappy land was as James I's had been, 
to dispossess the native Irish and to replace 
them by Protestant settlers. As a first step 
in depopulation all who had been concerned in 
the Protestant massacre were court-martialled 
and in most cases they were put to death. 
A sadder fate befell the wives and children of 
Irish officers and soldiers who had left them 
behind and enlisted in foreign service, for they 
were shipped to the West Indies and sold as 
slaves. 

/ 127 



Oliver Cromwell 

The evicted Irish, driven from the homes 
where they had tilled their fertile fields from gen- 
eration to generation, were allowed to settle on a 
strip of desolate land in Connaught between the 
Shannon and the sea. An order was issued that 
from May 1, 1654, all who were found else- 
where were to be put to death. So barren and 
fruitless was their new inheritance that one 
of the Parliamentary commissioners sent to 
investigate wrote that there was not "water 
enough to drown a man, trees enough to hang 
a man, or earth enough to bury a man." 

The race could not thus be stamped out. 
The new settlers intermarried with the con- 
quered, many of whom made terms with their 
supplanters. Seeds of hatred had been sown 
between Irish Catholic and English Protestant 
which were to ripen to a full harvest in the time 
to come. And to this day the Protector's name 
is associated with the bitter racial and religious 
feud by the peasant's deepest oath, "the curse 
of Cromwell." 



128 



CHAPTER XV: Cromwell in 
Scotland 

THE conquering hero returned to Eng- 
land. He was welcomed by Fairfax 
and the chief officers at Hounslow 
Heath, and they rode with him in triumphant 
progress to Hyde Park, amid tumults of wild 
rejoicing. 

While he was still absent Parliament had 
secured for him the use of the Cockpit, a house 
opposite Whitehall. Here his wife and two un- 
married daughters lived, and here his married 
children came on visits to see their mother and 
hear the news of town. With what eagerness 
they must have welcomed him on his return! 
What family news there must have been to 
tell! What stories of the great campaign! 
What tender solicitude his wife must have 
expressed for all that he had suffered! How 
gladly would she have kept him at home — 
but the time to sheath his sword was not yet. 

Scotland had still to be reckoned with. The 
proclamation of Charles Stuart as Charles II 
was no empty form. The King and the Cove- 
nant were what the nation stood for, and 
this not for itself alone but for England and 
Ireland. 

129 



Oliver Cromwell 

If Charles would have Scotland's help to re- 
gain his father's throne he must not only accept 
the Covenant himself, but he must force it on his 
unwilling subjects when he should come into 
his own again. Since England would not have 
a king — Charles Stuart or any other — forced on 
her by Scotland, the issue had to be put to 
the test of trial by battle. 

To many men of the Commonwealth the 
Scottish campaign was not so easily justified as 
the Irish one. The two warring nations were 
both Protestant and the difference between 
Presbyterian and Independent was but slight. 
Both sects sought guidance from the Scriptures 
— the Old Testament by preference — and 
hurled texts at one another as the last 
word in argument. Both believed in the direct 
influence of God in human affairs, and 
both equally distrusted and detested Roman 
Catholicism. Fairfax, with whom such con- 
siderations had much weight, under his wife's 
advice declined to take part in the cam- 
paign. Cromwell entreated his old chief to 
reconsider his decision — but in vain, and from 
this time onward Fairfax no longer plays a 
prominent part in history. By an Act of 
June 26, 1650, Cromwell was appointed Com- 
mander-in-Chief in his stead. Congratulations 
poured in upon him, but he had too much 

130 



Cromwell in Scotland 

to do to pay much heed to them, for the 
Scottish expedition had to be set on foot 
immediately. 

In spite of his many preoccupations Cromwell 
found time to write to Richard Mayor, and 
to make inquiries after his baby grandchild: 
"I should be glad to hear how the little brat 
doth. I could chide both Father and Mother 
for their neglects of me: I know my son is idle 
but I had better thoughts of Doll. ... I 
hope you give my son good counsel; I believe 
he needs it. He is in the dangerous time of 
his age; and it's a veiy vain world. 0, how 
good it is to close with Christ betimes! — there 
is nothing else worth the looking after. . . . 
Great place and business in the world is not 
worth the looking after; I should have no 
conifort in mine but that my hope is in the 
Lord's presence. I have not sought these 
things; truly I have been called unto them by 
the Lord; and therefore I am not without 
some assurance that He will enable His poor 
worm and weak servant to do His will, and 
to fulfil my generation. In this I desire your 
prayers." 

Cromwell had under him Major-General Lam- 
bert, Fleetwood and Monk, and a force of some 
16,000 men. Leaving London on June 29 he 
marched northward and passed through Berwick 

131 



Oliver Cromwell 

on July 22. Thence he crept cautiously along the 
coast, using the ships of the English fleet, which 
had followed him up, for his base of provisions. 

On reaching Musselburgh, Cromwell issued a 
letter to the members of the General Assembly 
of the Kirk of Scotland, in which he dealt 
straightly with them. He would have averted 
warfare if he could, but if it were to be: 
"Your own guilt is too much for you to bear, 
bring not therefore upon yourselves the blood 
of innocent men — deceived with pretences of 
King and Covenant; from whose eyes you 
hide a better knowledge. . . . There may be 
a covenant made with Death and Hell; I will 
not say yours was so." 

Cromwell can hardly have expected a spirited 
people to have laid down their arms on receipt 
of this communication. If he did, his expecta- 
tions were vain. On August 13 he reached 
Braid Hill outside Edinburgh. Here his former 
comrade of Marston Moor, David Leslie, was 
now the commander of his foes, and with some 
18,000 men was strongly entrenched. Leslie 
had no intention of coming out into the open. 
His aim was to weary and starve out the English 
forces. By the end of August they were in a 
sorry plight and the half-fed men fell an easy 
prey to disease. Seeing that an engagement at 
Edinburgh was out of the question, Cromwell 

132 



Cromwell in Scotland 

retreated thirty miles south to Dunbar, on the 
coast. Leslie followed him in close pursuit and 
encamped his troops on the Lammermuir Hills, 
occupying the rocky pass at Copperspath, thus 
cutting off Cromwell's retreat to England. 
Leslie, with his troops in the commanding 
position, may well have anticipated victory. 
Cromwell, hemmed in by the hills and the sea, 
and with the road to England blocked, did 
not blind himself to the possibility of defeat. 
His courage rose with difficulties — and he was 
ever a man of resource. He wrote a letter 
to the Governor of Newcastle, marking it 
"Haste, Haste" : "The enemy hath blocked 
up our way at the pass of Copperspath, through 
which we cannot get without almost a miracle. 
He lieth so upon the hills that we know not 
how to come that way without great difficulty; 
and our lying here daily consumeth our men, 
who fall sick beyond imagination." He begged 
him to get together what forces he could, and 
to send to friends in the south to help with 
more: "Let H. Vane know what I write. I 
would not make it public lest danger should 
accrue thereby." 

Fate played into Cromwell's hands. Had 
Leslie stuck to his original scheme — which was 
to fall on Cromwell's rear when he attempted to 
force the road south — the defeat of the English 

i33 



Oliver Cromwell 

forces was all but inevitable. As it was, he 
changed his plans — counselled, some said, by 
his ministers, to whom the soldiers paid more 
heed than to the generals. The English fleet 
lay at sea, the English army was on the shore, 
and Leslie, closely watching their movements, 
thought that Cromwell in his desperation was 
going to embark guns and foot-soldiers. Conse- 
quently he began to move his troops down 
from the hills to prevent their embarkation. 
Cromwell, walking with Lambert, noticed the 
change of plans and cried exultingly: "The 
Lord hath delivered them into our hands." 

Leslie's army was now in a vulnerable posi- 
tion, since his left wing was shut in between 
hill and ravine, and the centre, with the hills 
at its back, was too much cramped to move 
freely. With his strategic eye Cromwell saw 
that what he had to do was to defeat the right 
wing, then the whole of the army would be in 
confusion. 

The night of September 2 was windy and 
wet. The harvest moon rose in the stormy 
sky and shed a ghastly light on the motionless 
figures sheltering by the stacks of sodden corn. 
Some slept fitfully, some prayed mournfully, 
but all were ready for instant action. As the 
early dawn rose over mountain and sea the 
blare of trumpets broke the silence with the 

i34 



Cromwell in Scotland 

call to arms. Louder and louder they sounded 
forth, while from the throats of thousands of 
Englishmen rose the battle-cry, "The Lord of 
Hosts!" and from the opposite camp the 
rallying cry, "The Covenant!" To Lambert 
and Fleetwood, with six regiments of horse, 
were entrusted the attack on Leslie's right wing; 
Monk attacked the central wing, while Crom- 
well cannonaded the whole body of the Scottish 
army with his big guns. The Scottish lancers 
gave a good account of themselves and Lambert 
was driven back, but, rallying his troops, he 
charged once more and broke through the 
ranks. The fight was short and sharp. "At 
push of pike" the English repelled the foe. 
After an hour's fierce attack the sun broke out 
red over the northern sea and was reflected in 
the dyed waters of the burn. In that hour 
terrible execution had been done and the 
Scottish army was utterly defeated. In his 
exultation Cromwell cried aloud: "Let God 
arise and let His enemies be scattered." He 
ordered his victorious army to sing the 117th 
Psalm: "O praise the Lord, all ye nations: 
praise Him all ye people. For His merciful 
kindness is great toward us: and the truth of 
the Lord endureth for ever. Praise ye the 
Lord." 

The men's voices rang out clear in the early 

i3S 



Oliver Cromwell 

autumn air. When the last sounds had died 
away their leader bade them pursue the enemy. 
For eight miles they gave chase, killing, wound- 
ing and taking prisoner. Three thousand were 
killed, ten thousand taken prisoner; the bag- 
gage and artillery fell into the hands of the 
victors; two hundred colours were taken, to be 
hung in Westminster Hall beside the trophies 
of Preston. The English losses were about 
thirty men and a couple of officers. 

On the morrow Cromwell issued a proclama- 
tion by beat of drum, informing the country- 
folk they might take away their wounded 
provided they did not purloin any arms. He 
must have spent the greater part of that day 
writing letters. In one to Speaker Lenthall 
he declared that the enemy were "as stubble 
to their swords." He paid a fine tribute 
to his men: "I believe I may speak it with- 
out partiality: both your Commanders and 
others in their several places, and soldiers also, 
were acted [actuated] with as much courage, 
as ever hath been seen in any action since this 
war." He then went on to make an impas- 
sioned plea: "It is easy to say, the Lord hath 
done this. It would do you good to see and 
hear our poor foot to go up and down making 
their boast of God. But, sir, it's in your hands, 
and by these eminent mercies God puts it 

136 



Cromwell in Scotland 

more into your hands. . . . We that serve you 
beg of you not to own us — but God alone. 
We pray you own His people more and more; 
for they are the chariots and horsemen of 
Israel. Disown yourselves; — but own your 
authority and improve it to curb the proud 
and the insolent, such as would disturb the 
tranquillity of England, though under what spe- 
cious pretences soever. Relieve the oppressed, 
hear the groans of poor prisoners in England. 
Be pleased to reform the abuses of all pro- 
fessions; — and if there be any one that makes 
many poor to make a few rich, that suits not 
a Commonwealth." In these last few words 
we have the key-note to Cromwell's high ideal 
for the State. The army had fought the long 
fight of the Civil War nearly to a finish; this 
was to be the reward. 

In the hour of victory Cromwell's thoughts 
turned homeward and he wrote to his wife, 
knowing well her terrible anxiety. She must 
have suffered much, separated from him and 
not knowing from week to week how he fared, 
waiting and watching. The heaviest burden of 
war always falls on the women. The letter 
runs : 

"My Dearest, I have not leisure to write 
much. But I could chide thee that in many of 
thy letters thou writest to me, that I should 

i37 



Oliver Cromwell 

not be unmindful of thee and thy little ones. 
Truly, if I love you not too well, I think I err 
not on the other hand much. Thou art dearer 
to me than any creature, let that suffice." 
Her heart might well have failed her as she read 
on. The toils of war had told on her husband 
and he was no longer the strong, vigorous man 
of yore: "I assure thee, I grow an old man 
and feel infirmities of age marvellously stealing 
upon me." 

Some letters from the wife to the husband 
doubtless went astray, for some time later 
Cromwell wrote to complain that he had not 
heard from her. "I wonder you should blame 
me," she answered, "for writing no oftener, 
when I have sent three for one: I cannot but 
think they are miscarried. Truly if I know 
my own heart, I should as soon neglect myself 
as to omit the least thought toward you, who 
in doing it, I must do it to myself. But when 
I do write, my dear, I seldom have any satisfac- 
tory answer; which makes me think my writ- 
ing is slighted; as well it may: but I cannot 
but think your love covers my weakness and 
infirmities." 

Dunbar did not end the Scottish campaign, 
though its immediate result was that Leith 
and Edinburgh and part of the Lowlands were 
held for Parliament. Cromwell did not know 

138 



Cromwell in Scotland 

what to do with his sick, wounded, and starving 
prisoners, and was obliged to liberate many of 
them. Parliament ordered that a medal should 
be struck in honour of the victory, bearing on 
one side a profiled head of Cromwell surmounted 
by the inscription "The Lord of Hosts," and 
on the reverse a representation of the House of 
Commons. There was work to be done in the 
following winter: moss-troopers had to be put 
down, isolated castles had to be taken. A 
touch of humour occasionally brightens the 
sordid story of warfare. Thus, when Colonel 
Fenwick summoned the Governor of Hume 
Castle to surrender to General Cromwell, 
the Governor replied: "I know not Crom- 
well, and as for my castle it is built on a 
rock." And, breaking out into verse, he de- 
clared : 

"I, William of the Wastle 
Am now in my castle; 
And aw the dogs in the town 
Shanna gar me x gang down." 

One cannot help feeling sorry that the spirited 
William was made to "gang down" by a 
fusillade of Colonel Fenwick's guns. 

In the early part of the year the Scots, who 

had recovered somewhat after the Dunbar 

disaster, determined to crown their Scottish 

1 Gar me = make me. 

139 



Oliver Cromwell 

monarch at Scone. Charles had accepted the 
conditions of his northern subjects, had sworn 
to the Covenant which he, as his sire before 
him, cordially hated and intended to flout 
when opportunity served. He was crowned with 
all due ceremony, "all men making show of 
joy and of being united to serve His Majesty." 
In the course of the spring Cromwell became 
so seriously ill that he thought his life's work 
was over. Those about him noticed that a 
great change had come upon him and that his 
arduous life was wearing him out. Parlia- 
ment was in great alarm. By the middle of 
March the worst was over and he was able to 
dine with his officers and be very cheerful and 
pleasant. Next month he wrote a reassuring 
letter to his anxious wife: "I praise the Lord 
I am increased in strength in my outward man. 
But that will not satisfy me except I get a 
heart to love and serve my Heavenly Father 
better. . . . Pray for me, truly I do daily for 
thee, and the dear family." His daughter 
Betty was evidently of a frivolous turn of 
mind, and the father was as greatly concerned 
about her light-heartedness as he had been 
about Dick's idleness. "Mind poor Betty 
of the Lord's great mercy. Oh, I desire her 
not only to seek the Lord in her necessity, 
but indeed and in truth to turn to the Lord; 

140 



Cromwell in Scotland 

and to keep close to Him; and to take heed of 
a departing heart, and of being cozened with 
worldly vanities and worldly company, which 
I doubt she is too subject to." 

Cromwell still continued to be much of an 
invalid and Parliament sent down two doctors 
to see him and to report on his condition. They 
suggested that he should return to England for 
change of air in order to recover, but Cromwell 
remained at his post, and in June he was 
about once more and able to continue the 
campaign. 

The Parliamentary army was ordered to 
assemble at its old camp on the Pentland Hills. 
Cromwell's first intention was to take Stirling, 
but here Leslie was too strongly entrenched 
and could not be dislodged. Cromwell sent 
Lambert and two regiments across the Forth 
to Fife, and at Inverkeithing Lambert encoun- 
tered a force of Scottish soldiers and was 
able to report victory to his chief. On the 
receipt of this good news Cromwell crossed the 
Forth with the main body of the army, and, 
leaving Stirling on the left, he marched north 
to Perth, which surrendered to him on August 2. 
Leslie was thus cut off from his northern 
supplies. 

A few days earlier the Royalists had decided 
that the best course was to invade England, 

141 



Oliver Cromwell 

and Charles, with an army of under sixteen 
thousand men, marched to the border and 
entered the country by Carlisle, taking the 
western route southward through Lancashire. 

Cromwell decided on immediate pursuit, and 
on August 6, leaving Monk in Scotland to attend 
to affairs there, he took the eastern route 
southward, through Yorkshire. Both com- 
manders hoped for reinforcements: Charles was 
to be grievously disappointed, for there was 
no popular rising in his favour, and Lord 
Derby, who had raised a troop, was defeated 
by Lilburn before he could join him. The 
Parliamentary army, however, was reinforced 
all along the line — for Cromwell had sent urgent 
messages to the Council of State to raise the 
local Militia, and so excellent was the organiza- 
tion that his army was increased to some thirty 
thousand men. 

Charles was the first to reach Worcester, 
where he took up a strong position on the 
strip of land between the Severn and the Teme; 
he then ordered the bridges to be broken down, 
while he kept a detachment of his forces on the 
eastern bank of the river. 

Cromwell marched South at the head of the 
Eastern Association at the average rate of some 
thirty miles and over a day. It was a record 
march in military annals, for, with none of the 

142 






Cromwell in Scotland 

modern means of communication, it went with- 
out a hitch. At Coventry he was joined by 
Lambert and Harrison with reinforcements, and 
on August 28 they were on the outskirts of 
Worcester. In spite of Charles's precaution in 
breaking down the bridges, a few planks 
remained at Upton-on-Severn, seven miles be- 
low the town. Here a party of Fleetwood's 
troopers managed to scramble across, hold 
their own in a skirmish with a handful of 
Royalists, and repair the bridge sufficiently to 
make it possible to pass troops over. Cromwell 
built bridges of boats across the Severn and the 
Teme almost at the junction of the two rivers, 
thus gaining access to both banks and being 
able to pass his men backward and forward 
according to the fortune of war. The Parlia- 
mentary army was double that of the Royalist, 
so that for once the advantage in numbers was 
largely on their side. 

The battle opened on the anniversary of 
Dunbar, September 3. Cromwell, leading the 
van, was the first to pass over the bridge of 
boats across the Severn to the western bank, 
and "set foot on the enemy's ground." Fleet- 
wood, who had previously diverted the Royalist 
attention by making as though he would 
contest Powick Bridge, closely held by the 
Royalists, two miles lower down the river, left 

143 



Oliver Cromwell 

reinforcements there, and crossed to the Lord 
General's assistance by the Teme boat-bridge. 
The Royalists were not immediately on the 
spot to oppose the landing. A fierce fight 
ensued. The Scottish forces fought gallantly 
and stubbornly, but they were largely out- 
numbered and were beaten from hedge to 
hedge until driven into Worcester. 

Charles, with a few Cavaliers to bear him 
company, watching the issue from the cathedral 
tower, marked the grave danger of the situation. 
He sent urgent orders to attack the remainder 
of Cromwell's army still on the eastern bank 
of the Severn, and himself sallied out of Wor- 
cester town at the head of all the forces he could 
muster. The Lord General no sooner saw this 
manoeuvre than he himself and his detachments 
recrossed to the eastern bank to do further 
battle. For three hours they contested for 
mastery, at push of pike. At last the enemy 
were driven into the town, and the battle 
was finished in the streets, where there was a 
frightful carnage. The Royalist army was 
utterly defeated, the cavalry fled northward, 
to be pursued and taken prisoner, the infantry 
laid down their arms. Not a single regiment, 
and a very few survivor 3, reached Scotland. 
Three thousand Scots were killed, ten thousand 
were taken prisoners. What a sight the wretched 

144 



Cromwell in Scotland 

town presented — the narrow streets blocked with 
the dead bodies of men and horses,, the cathedral 
thronged with prisoners, knights and noble- 
men, the flower of Scottish chivalry! The 
wounded lay by the roadside dying unattended. 

Charles was among the few who escaped. The 
story of his romantic adventures after Worcester 
has become almost a legend. He hid for a 
couple of days in an oak-tree while the soldiers 
were searching the wood beneath; he lodged 
in the huts of the peasantry; he hid in priests' 
holes; he dressed as a serving-man. But 
though there was a reward of £1000 on his 
head and his description was circulated abroad, 
there was none to betray him and he escaped 
to France. 

Worcester virtually ended the Scottish cam- 
paign, since there was no army left to put in 
the field against General Monk and his regi- 
ments in Scotland. Dundee was sacked and 
other important towns yielded. 

Worcester was Cromwell's "crowning mercy," 
and from that day he sheathed his sword. 



i45 



CHAPTER XVI: New Foes 
Arise 

TIE Puritans gave to English literature 
one of its greatest names — that of 
John Milton. As we have seen, he 
devoted himself to the service of the State. 
He was inspired by the events of the time to 
dedicate to Cromwell one of his magnificent 
sonnets : 

Cromwell, our chief of men, who through a cloud 
Not of war only, but detractions rude, 
Guided by faith and matchless fortitude, 

To peace and truth thy glorious way hast ploughed, 

And on the neck of crowned Fortune proud 

Hast reared God's trophies, and His work pursued, 
While Darwen stream, with blood of Scots imbrued, 

And Dunbar field, resounds thy praises loud, 

And Worcester's laureate wreath. Yet much remains 
To conquer still : Peace hath her victories 
No less renowned than War. New foes arise 

Threat'ning to bind our souls with secular chains: 
Help us to save free conscience from the paw 
Of hireling wolves, whose gospel is their maw. 

Such was Cromwell's task. Before he set to 
work to accomplish it — and much more beside 
— he was to receive full tribute of gratitude 
for his services to the Commonwealth. Nine 

146 



New Foes Arise 

days after his victory at Worcester he was 
welcomed on the outskirts of London by the 
Speaker and other members of the House of 
Commons, civic dignitaries, and Puritan gentle- 
men of standing, anxious to do him honour and 
to escort him to the capital. Eager sightseers 
lined the roadways waiting to cheer the vic- 
torious general in his hour of triumph. The 
Life-guards passed, their accoutrements glitter- 
ing in the autumn sunshine; the soberly clad 
Puritan gentlemen rode by with dignified mien; 
then came the city troops and the Speaker in 
his coach, followed by three hundred equi- 
pages. The cavalcade rolled on — but where 
was the hero of the hour? He had passed 
all but unnoticed, having taken refuge in the 
Speaker's carriage. Worn out with the toils 
of war, he had felt unequal to a public 
demonstration. 

As he peered forth at the country-folk and 
townsfolk, men, women, and children, one 
remarked to him: "What a crowd has come 
to see your Lordship's triumph!" 

"Yes, but if it were to see me hanged, how 
many more would there be!" was the ironic 
reply. 

The guns in St James's Park boomed their 
welcome; cheer upon cheer greeted his arrival 
— he was home once more ! 

147 



Oliver Cromwell 

To each member of the deputation he pre- 
sented a horse and a couple of Scotsmen — the 
latter strikes a curious note to modern ears! 
Few had the humanity to release their captives, 
who were afterward held up to ransom or 
sold as slaves to the colonies. Parliament 
voted the General four thousand pounds and the 
royal palace of Hampton Court as a residence, 
thus linking up his fortunes with that of his 
first known kinsman, Thomas Cromwell, for 
Hampton Court had been built and presented 
to the King by Thomas Cromwell's patron, 
Cardinal Wolsey. The City rendered homage to 
the victor by inviting him to a banquet at 
Merchant Taylor's Hall. 

When all due honour had been paid to him, 
Cromwell had to get into harness once more. 
What was now to' be the settlement of the 
country? What was to be the outcome of the 
Civil War in England, the triumphs in Ireland 
and Scotland? At present the Government 
was in the hands of what was virtually an 
oligarchy, the remnant of the Long Parliament, 
consisting of men who had once been elected 
and who had remained in office in spite of the 
many changes that had taken place. This 
arrangement could not go on for ever. A meet- 
ing was held at Speaker Lenthall's house in 
Chancery Lane to which representatives of 

148 



New Foes Arise 

Parliament and the Army were invited, to dis- 
cuss the future settlement of the nation, "the old 
King being dead, and his son being defeated." 
Two solutions were suggested — one that the 
country should be an absolute Republic, the 
other that there should be a "mixture of 
monarchy." As Whitlocke put it: "The 
laws of England are so interwoven with the 
power and practice of monarchy, that to settle 
a Government without something of monarchy 
in it would make so great an alteration in 
the proceedings of our law, that you will 
scarce have time to rectify it, nor can we well 
foresee the inconveniences which will arise 
thereby." 

Whitlocke's solution was to invite the King's 
third son, the Duke of York, who was too 
young to have any prejudices, to accept the 
throne on conditions. Cromwell fully saw that 
"that would be a business of more than 
ordinary difficulty," though he believed that a 
settlement with somewhat of monarchical 
power in it would be most effectual. 

Was it already in Cromwell's mind what had 
been whispered abroad: "This man will make 
himself our King"? 

Meantime, awaiting the tide of events, the 
country was ruled by the Council of State 
appointed by the House of Commons, consisting 

149 



Oliver Cromwell 

of members of Parliament and officers of the 
army. Cromwell was the leading spirit on the 
Council, and for the next nineteen months he 
was busily occupied with the question of what 
was to be the final form of government for the 
nation. One thing was certain in the minds of 
the Army party clamouring for reform, and that 
was that the Long Parliament must be dissolved. 
Unfortunately the members of the Long Parlia- 
ment did not agree with this view. Cromwell 
urged that the question should be put to the 
vote. It was carried with the bare majority of 
two, and then with the restriction that the dis- 
solution should not take place for three years. 
A spurt of activity overtook the threatened 
members. An Amnesty Bill, under which Roy- 
alists who had not taken part in the battle 
or Worcester need no longer fear punishment 
for actions during the Civil War, was passed. 
It was carried largely owing to Cromwell's 
insistence, but though it was a wise measure 
and made for peace, his part in it was misinter- 
preted by his enemies as an attempt to make 
for himself many new friends. There was much 
work for Parliament to do; the political union 
of Scotland with England was debated, as were 
long-needed legal and social reforms and a settle- 
ment of the system of Church government, 
which was in a state of chaos. Parliament was 

150 




CROMWELL RIDES THROUGH LONDON 



New Foes Arise 

anxious to distract public attention by naval 
exploits, and all reforms were at a standstill 
when the country became involved in the Dutch 
War, which was fostered by Vane. To Crom- 
well especially, and to the army as a whole, the 
war was hateful, both because it was a conflict 
between two Protestant powers who should 
have been allies and because it laid an 
extra burden of expense on the impoverished 
country. 

Hostilities finally broke out over the Naviga- 
tion Act — passed expressly to damage Dutch 
commerce, since it aimed a blow at their carry- 
ing trade. It prohibited the importation of 
foreign goods to England in any but the vessel of 
the country where they were produced. Monk, 
who had seen much service, and Blake, the 
greatest naval commander of the Common- 
wealth, were to meet on the seas the renowned 
Dutch admirals, Reuter and Van Tromp — and 
to meet their match! For Blake's defeat by 
Van Tromp off Dungeness in 1652 was not fully 
revenged until the February of the following 
year, when in a three days' engagement he 
defeated the Dutch fleet off Portland. The 
ultimate success on the seas, both over the 
Dutch and in putting down Royalist privateers, 
raised the prestige of the Commonwealth in 
the eyes of Europe, but it did not serve to 

151 



Oliver Cromwell 

keep the members of the Long Parliament 
in office. 

Cromwell's home life had not been without 
its sorrows. His son-in-law, Ireton, had died 
in Ireland three months after Worcester, worn 
out by the fatigues and anxieties of his position. 
Bridget was a widow, and though she soon 
consoled herself by marrying her husband's 
future successor, Fleetwood, her father felt 
the loss for himself and for her very deeply. 
Some thought that had Ireton lived he would 
have exercised a restraining influence over 
Cromwell, and his ambition would have been 
checked by the stern virtue of the younger 
man. However that may be, not long after 
Ireton's death Cromwell's mind, still possessed 
by thoughts of the future of the country, 
had come to a definite decision. 

Walking one November day of 1652 in 
St James's Park, with Whitlocke as his com- 
panion, he sounded him. They conversed 
together on the present dangers of the State. 
Whitlocke laid the fault on the arrogance of 
the army, Cromwell on the self-seeking, greedy 
and unscrupulous members of Parliament. Both 
agreed that the Commonwealth itself was in 
danger from all these internal feuds. Suddenly 
Cromwell sprang upon his companion what had 
been in his mind all the time: "What if 

152 



New Foes Arise 

a man should take upon him to be King?" 
,Whitlocke soberly pointed out grave objections, 
and urged that the only possible King was 
Charles Stuart. "My Lord General did not 
in words express any anger but only by looks 
and carriage." 

For some months past repeated conferences 
had taken place between army officers and 
members of Parliament, and at last a Bill for 
a "New Representative" — that is a newly 
elected body of men — was before the House. 

A meeting took place at Cromwell's rooms 
on April 19, 1653. Sir Henry Vane discussed 
the question as to whether the sitting members 
should remain in office during the next Parlia- 
ment and should have a right to veto any elected 
representative whom they considered undesir- 
able. As a matter of fact, neither Parliament 
nor the Army dared risk anything approaching a 
general election: some form of scrutiny would 
be necessary, even with a restricted franchise, 
for neither Roman Catholics nor Royalists 
would be electors. Vane's proposal would 
have meant that the Long Parliament would be 
reinforced by a few new men and that all 
the present evils would continue. Cromwell's 
solution was that they should "devolve their 
trust to some well-affected men, such as had 
an interest in the nation." 

iS3 



Oliver Cromwell 

The conference broke up and was summoned 
to meet again on the morrow for further 
discussion. Next morning, when Cromwell was 
attending his business at Whitehall, he was 
informed by a messenger that the House was 
sitting and was occupied in pushing through 
a Bill at top speed which would keep the present 
members in office. He did not believe it at 
first, and it was not until two further messengers 
confirmed the tidings that he made ready for 
instant action. Since the Commons had broken 
faith with the army council, he would take 
the law into his own hands. Clad as he was 
in his plain morning dress — a black suit with 
worsted stockings — accompanied by Lambert 
and other officers, with a band of musketeers, 
he rode down to the House. In gloomy silence 
he took his seat and listened to Vane, who was 
addressing the Commons. For a quarter of 
an hour he waited, then Vane sat down and 
the Speaker was about to put to the vote the 
question "that this Bill shall pass?" 

Cromwell beckoned to Harrison and muttered 
to him: "This is the time I must do it." 

"Sir, the work is very great and dangerous," 
Harrison replied; "therefore I desire you 
seriously to consider of it before you engage 



in it." 



You say well," was the curt response. 
i54 



New Foes Arise 

Cromwell then rose in his place, uncovered 
his head, and spoke out all that was in his 
heart. His first words were conciliatory in 
appearance but ironic in intention. He praised 
the members for the care and pains they had 
taken for the public good. Then suddenly all 
urbanity forsook him and his harsh, strident 
voice rang out in bitter upbraiding for "their 
injustice, delays of justice, and self-interest." 

"It is a strange language this; unusual 
within the walls of Parliament and from one 
we have so highly honoured, and one . . ." 

"Come, come," thundered Cromwell, "we 
have had enough of this. I will put an end to 
your prating." 

Crushing his hat on his head, he stepped out 
upon the floor of the House, stamping his feet 
in anger. "It is not fit that you should sit 
here any longer! You have sat too long here 
for any good you have been doing lately. 
You shall now give place to better men." 

The musketeers entered at his word of 
command to Harrison, and all the time he 
blazed out at the outraged members like a 
quick-firing gun. 

"You call yourself a Parliament, you are 
no Parliament. I say you are no Parliament: 
some of you are drunkards " — and his eye pierced 
an unfortunate member who was known to 

i55 



Oliver Cromwell 

be self-indulgent. Still more contemptuous 
phrases were hurled at other sinners whose 
private record would not bear scrutiny. They 
quivered under the lash of his tongue. 

Vane's voice was heard in the general uproar. 
"This is not honest," he said; "yea, it is 
against morality and honesty." 

"Oh, Sir Henry Vane, Sir Henry Vane," 
broke in Cromwell, "the Lord deliver me from 
Sir Henry Vane. . . . Corrupt unjust persons 
scandalous to the profession of the Gospel; 
how can you be a Parliament for God's people? 
Depart, I say, and let us have done with you. 
In the name of God — go." 

"Take away that bauble!" he commanded, 
as he caught sight of the mace lying on the 
Speaker's table. 

"Fetch him down," he went on, as his glance 
fell on the Speaker himself. Lenthall stood his 
ground but was removed, and other members 
gradually dispersed. 

Cromwell fired a parting shot: "It is you 
who have forced me to do this. I have sought 
the Lord day and night that He would rather 
slay me than put me upon the doing of this 
work." He snatched the obnoxious Bill from 
the clerk, seized the records, cleared the House, 
locked the door, and, putting the key in his 
pocket, returned to Whitehall. 

156 



New Foes Arise 

In the afternoon he attended the Council 
of State. Since it had been created by Parlia- 
ment it no longer had any sanction. The 
members were sitting. "If you are met here 
as private persons," he informed them, "you 
shall not be disturbed; but if as a Council of 
State, this is no place for you; and since you 
cannot but know what was done in the House 
this morning, so take notice that the Parliament 
is dissolved." 

Bradshaw, who was in the chair, would not 
thus be dismissed. 

"We have heard what you did at the House 
in the morning," he said, "and before many 
hours all England will hear it; but, Sir, you 
are mistaken to think that the Parliament is 
dissolved; for no power under Heaven can 
dissolve them but themselves; therefore take 
you notice of that." 

Bradshaw was the only man whose speech 
would qualify Cromwell's later statement: 
"We did not hear a dog bark at their going." 



i57 



CHAPTER XVII: Praise God 
Barebones 

ON April 21, 1653, England was entirely 
without any form of government. A 
Council of State was established which 
consisted of a dozen men with Cromwell at 
their head, since Vane refused the post. A 
freely elected Parliament was out of the question, 
and as a temporary expedient Cromwell decided 
to summon a Convention consisting of "divers 
persons fearing God, and of approved Fidelity 
and Honesty." They were bidden to appear at 
the Council Chamber in Whitehall in the begin- 
ning of July. They were for the most part the 
nominees of Puritan ministers, without the 
slightest knowledge of Parliamentary business 
— virtue alone was the qualification for states- 
manship. One hundred and forty members 
were thus chosen, Cromwell's son Henry among 
them. Fairfax declined to sit, but Blake and 
Monk accepted, as did eighteen members of 
the Long Parliament. There was great surprise 
that so many consented to come, and from such 
hands "to take upon them the supreme Autho- 
rity of the Nation: considering how little right 
Cromwell and his officers had to give it, or these 
gentlemen to take it." It is interesting to 

158 



Praise God Barebones 

know that Irish and Scottish interests were 
represented by special nominees. 

For the most part the members were men of 
some distinction, though one, Mr Praise God 
Barebones, rested his sole claim to notoriety 
on giving the assembly its nickname. The 
members of the Convention soon after meeting 
declared they were a Parliament — and as "The 
Little Parliament" the assembly is also known. 

The first meeting was held on July 4, 1653. 
Each person was given a ticket with his name 
on his entrance. The members were seated 
round a table while Cromwell stood near the 
window. To keep the assembly in the right 
note of godliness, Frederic Rouse, who had 
written a second-rate metrical version of the 
Psalms, was elected Speaker. When all was 
in readiness Cromwell addressed the members 
in a remarkable speech, the main purport of 
which was that they were summoned by God's 
will to do God's business, and that in doing it 
they should above all be tolerant of other men's 
views. He spoke of "that series of Providences 
wherein the Lord hath appeared, dispensing won- 
derful things to these nations from the beginning 
of our troubles to this very day. . . . The King 
removed and brought to justice and many great 
ones with him. The House of Peers laid aside. 
The House of Commons itself the representative 

i59 



Oliver Cromwell 

of the people of England winnowed, sifted, and 
brought to a handful. ... I think I may say for 
myself and my fellow-officers, that we had rather 
desired and studied healing and looking forward 
than to rake into sores and to look backward. 

"Truly God hath called you to do this work, 
by, I think, as wonderful Providences as ever 
passed upon the sons of men in so short a time. 
And truly, I think, taking the argument of 
necessity for the Government must not fall; 
taking the appearance of the hand of God 
in this thing — I think you would have been 
loath it should have been resigned into the 
hands of wicked men and enemies!" 

The assembly was convinced that it had insti- 
tuted the Reign of the Saints on earth. It was 
the first and only attempt to govern the country 
entirely by the precepts of the Bible, to have 
Christianity in the saddle riding forth to redress 
human wrongs. But since politics, like other 
callings, requires special training, it was a 
government by amateurs, leavened by a few old 
parliamentary hands. The members knew in a 
general way the reforms required, but they failed 
to grasp the necessity of advancing slowly. 
The new brooms swept too clean. The Church, 
property, law, and society were all to be set on 
a new and better basis. Parliament reckoned 
without the vested interests that were imperilled. 

1 60 



Praise God Barebones 

Too much reform got on the nation's nerves. 
The members were charged with acting on a 
design to ruin property with "enmity to know- 
ledge and a blind and ignorant fanaticism." 

"I am more troubled now by the knave than 
the fool," declared Cromwell, who grew alarmed 
at their diligence and their one policy of "Over- 
turn, Overturn!" By nature a Conservative, 
in the stress of public affairs a practical politician 
— an opportunist, as we should call him now — 
he knew that they were going too far and that 
"root and branch" reform was impracticable. 

He opened his mind freely in a letter to his 
new son-in-law, Lieutenant- General Fleetwood: 

"Truly I never more needed all helps from 
my Christian friends than now! Fain would I 
have my service accepted of the Saints, if the 
Lord will; — but it is not so. Being of different 
judgments, and 'those' of each sort seeking 
most to propagate their own, that spirit of 
kindness that is to them all, is hardly accepted 
of any. I hope I can say it, my life has been 
a willing sacrifice — and I hope, for them all." 
For a moment he then forgot his public preoccu- 
pations in the thought of his daughter and her 
newly born child: "My love to thy dear Wife 
— whom indeed I entirely love, both naturally, 
and upon the best account; — and my blessing, 
if it be worth anything, upon thy little Babe." 

161 



Oliver Cromwell 

The Barebones Parliament sat for five 
months. Carlyle, in his trenchant vein, declares 
that "the farther it advanced toward real 
Christianism in human affairs, the louder grew 
the shrieks of Sham-Christianism." This is as it 
may be. The fact is that, unless sanctity be 
allied to a rare genius for statesmanship, the 
children of this world are wiser in politics than 
the children of light, since they understand men 
as they are and not as they would have them 
be. At least these Saints had wisdom enough 
to know that they did not carry the country 
with them. On December 2, 1653, it was moved 
that the sitting of the Parliament was no 
longer for the good of the Commonwealth, and 
that the members should deliver back to 
the Lord General Cromwell the powers they 
had received from him. A minority dissented 
and remained in their seats. The Serjeant 
shouldered the mace, and, accompanied by 
the Speaker and the majority, left the House 
and proceeded to Whitehall, where Cromwell ex- 
pressed — some said simulated — surprise and emo- 
tion when they announced the formal resignation 
of their office. When this had been accepted a 
file of soldiers, with a couple of colonels to lead 
them, turned out the sitting members. 

The country was once more without a gov- 
ernment, but the Council of State, appointed 

162 



Praise God Barebones 

by the Little Parliament, had drawn up a 
written constitution known as the Instrument 
of Government. By this it was settled that 
a new Parliament should be elected to consist 
of four hundred members for England, with 
thirty apiece for Scotland and Ireland. A 
certain property qualification was necessary to 
secure a vote, and Roman Catholics and Malig- 
nants, as the Royalists were called, were to be 
excluded from the franchise, the former perma- 
nently, the latter temporarily. At the head of 
the government was to be a Lord Protector 
with strictly limited powers — but they were 
those of a constitutional king. He had the 
right to confer honours, to control the army and 
navy with the consent of Parliament, to pardon 
offenders, and to give assent to Bills — but 
should he withhold his assent for twenty days, 
the Bill became law without his approval. 

On the afternoon of December 16, 1653, 
Cromwell rode forth from Whitehall for the 
installation. Before him went the Commis- 
sioners of the Great Seal, the judges and 
barons fully robed, the Council of the Common- 
wealth, the Lord Mayor and Aldermen in official 
attire. Lastly came the man of destiny, soberly 
clad in plain black velvet, a gold band round his 
1 hat, accompanied by the officers of the army. 
The ceremony took place in the Court of 
163 



Oliver Cromwell 

Chancery, where a chair of state was the 
substitute for a throne. Cromwell stood un- 
covered as the terms of the powers conferred 
upon him were read out. He signed the parch- 
ment and took the oath to observe its conditions 
in face of them all. Then, formally seated, 
the Commissioner approached and delivered 
up the Seal, to receive it again at his hands, 
and the Lord Mayor went through the same 
ceremony with his cap and sword. When 
this was over the procession re-formed with 
the Lord Mayor in advance carrying the sword. 
It then wended its way to Whitehall, through 
the crowds of eager sightseers who thronged the 
cobbled streets. 

Heralds proclaimed the Lord Protector at the 
Old Exchange, the Palace Yard, and other 
places. Whitehall, St James's, Somerset House, 
and Windsor were reserved for his official use. 
The Lord Mayor and Common Council enter- 
tained him magnificently. 

What was the Puritan Court like, with the 
frugal, homely Elizabeth Cromwell — Her High- 
ness the Protectress — as hostess? It was a 
decorous Court and only men and women of 
good character could gain entrance there In 
this there was no distinction of persons. When 
Christina, Queen of Sweden, the only child of 
the famous soldier Gustavus Adolphus, a lady of 

164 




JOHN MILTON 



Praise God Barebones 

many adventures, expressed her intention of visit- 
ing England, Cromwell was distinctly discourag- 
ing, for he feared the effect of her bad example. 

The Cromwell family was not without its 
critics, and Mrs Hutchinson, with a pen dipped 
in dislike, is outspoken in her comments: 
"His wife and children were setting up for 
principality, which suited no better with any 
of them than scarlet on the ape; only, to 
speak the truth of himself, he had much 
natural greatness, and well became the place 
he had usurped. His daughter Fleetwood was 
humbled, and not exalted with these things, but 
the rest were insolent fools. Claypole, who 
married his daughter, and his son Henry, were 
two debauched, ungodly cavaliers. Richard 
was a peasant in his nature, yet gentle and 
virtuous, but became not greatness." 

Cromwell's mother lived to see his rise to 
supreme power and in 1654 she died at the 
age of ninety-four. A close tie had bound 
mother and son. She did not rejoice in his 
greatness, for it gave her hourly fear that an 
assassin's shot would find its billet in his 
breast. It was only by his daily and twice daily 
visits, in spite of all his business preoccupation, 
that she was reassured. In her last conscious 
moment she was blessing him: "My dear son, 
I leave my heart with thee. Good-night." 

165 



CHAPTER XVIII: Healing 

and Settling 

N^INE months were to pass before the 
new Parliament met. In the interval 
the Protector, with the Council of 
State, passed eighty-two ordinances, which had 
the force of law. The three main subjects 
dealt with were Church Government, Law, and 
Manners. 

How was the State Church to be governed? 
What toleration was to be shown to those 
outside the pale? Cromwell, whose broad- 
mindedness grew with years, would have had 
toleration for all. He would have permitted 
Mohammedans to worship in their own way 
rather than that one of God's children should 
be persecuted for conscience' sake. Roman 
Catholics and Jews he would have left free to 
exercise their religion in seclusion but public 
feeling was against him. The State Church was 
to be Puritan in its widest sense. Independents, 
Baptists, and Presbyterians were all entitled to 
officiate provided they convinced a committee 
of Triers that they were men with the grace of 
God in them, of holy unblameable conversa- 
tion, and fit to preach the Gospel. Inefficient 
ministers were expelled from their livings. The 

166 



Healing and Settling 

Prayer Book was forbidden, and the churches 
were closed to Episcopalians, who were per- 
mitted to worship only in private. 

Simpler processes of law, so that it should be 
"plain and less chargeable to the people," 
were ordained. It was even set down that all 
cases should be settled on the day of hearing. 
The ordinance was unpopular with the lawyers, 
who declared that they would not accept it; 
moreover, it was unpractical. Cromwell was 
far in advance of his time in his attempt to 
reform criminal law. He would have abolished 
the death penalty for anything but murder — 
yet it was not until the middle of the nineteenth 
century that this piece of humane legislation was 
put upon the statute book. 

The narrowest form of Puritanism came out 
when the Council passed ordinances restricting 
the pleasures of the people. Maypoles had 
been pulled down, by order, ten years earlier; 
plays and playhouses had long been banned. 
Bear-baiting, cock-fighting, and duelling — for 
which, it is true, nothing can be said — had all 
been suppressed. Horse-racing was forbidden 
for six months, but only in order to prevent the 
meetings from being used as a cloak for Royalist 
gatherings. Drunkenness and swearing were 
to be severely punished; minstrels and fiddlers 
who brought music to the countryside were to 

167 



Oliver Cromwell 

be dealt with as vagrants — why it is hard to 
tell. The strict keeping of the Lord's Day was 
to be observed; on that day inns and alehouses 
were closed, and, as travelling was looked upon 
as a godless pursuit, an order from a justice 
was necessary before one took a journey on 
Sunday. Even so innocent a recreation as 
walking might be regarded as "vain and 
profane" and treated accordingly. In spite 
of all these rules, until the Major-Generals (of 
whom we shall hear later) descended upon the 
country to act as policemen, with a watchful 
eye on lawbreakers, judges were lenient and 
juries refused to convict. Had it not been so, 
England would have been very moral — and 
very miserable! 

Cromwell was always greatly interested in 
education. In some ways it was a cheaper 
luxury then than it is now — for example, in the 
seventeenth century tuition at Eton cost only 
£1 a term. Cromwell suggested the institution 
of a college at Durham, but the scheme was 
stopped at the Restoration and the city had to 
wait for nearly two hundred years before it 
owned its university. He was Chancellor of 
the University of Oxford, and during his 
Protectorate the older universities nourished, 
producing many men of learning. 

On Sunday, September 3, 1654 — Cromwell's 
168 



Healing and Settling 

auspicious day — he met the first Parliament of 
his Protectorate. The state opening took place 
on the following day, when the Protector 
rode in state to Westminster Abbey, accom- 
panied by his son Henry, Lambert, and a full 
retinue. After the service and a sermon the 
members adjourned to the Painted Chamber. 
Here Cromwell, in one of his memorable 
speeches, harangued them on the past and 
the future. 

"You are met here," he said, "on the 
greatest occasion that, I believe, England ever 
saw; having upon your shoulders the interests 
of three great nations with the territories 
belonging to them; — and truly, I believe I may 
say it without any hyperbole, you have upon 
your shoulders the interests of all the Christian 
people in the world." 

Once more he reverted to God's dealings 
with the Commonwealth, saying that the only 
direct parallel to it in all history was when 
God brought Israel out of Egypt, "by many 
signs and wonders toward a place of peace." 
Cromwell, with his instinct for law and order, 
had little sympathy with the Levellers, the 
Socialists of his day. "Did not that Levelling 
principle tend to the reducing of all to 
an equality. . . . What was the purport of 
it, but to make the tenant as liberal a for- 

169 



Oliver Cromwell 

tune as the landlord. . . . The men of that 
principle, after they had served their own 
turns, would then have cried up property and 
interest fast enough." He reviewed what had 
already been done for the "Healing and 
Settling" of the country, the satisfactory rela- 
tion of the Commonwealth with foreign states, 
the conclusion of the Dutch War. But there 
was much yet to do. "It's one of the great 
ends of calling this Parliament, that the Ship of 
the Commonwealth may be brought into a safe 
harbour; which, I assure you, it will not be, 
without your counsel and advice." 

The members had no sooner taken their 
places in the House than they began to discuss 
"by what authority they came hither, and 
whether that which had convened them had 
a lawful power to that purpose." Cromwell 
was sorely tried, for if time were to be wasted 
in discussing their position there would be 
no end to it. They promised to accept him as 
Protector for five years. This would not do: 
certain fundamentals must be accepted. Once 
more Cromwell decided to coerce the House 
by what was virtually martial law. The Lord 
Mayor was bidden to guard the City; West- 
minster Hall was surrounded by soldiers, 
the doors of the House were locked. The 
astonished members, barred entrance, were 

170 



Healing and Settling 

summoned to meet the Protector at the Painted 
Chamber. He was deeply moved. His posi- 
tion had been called in question, and he felt 
that he had never sought it. 

"I called not myself to this place," he said; 
"I say again, I called not myself to this place! 
Of that God is witness — and I have many 
witnesses who, I do believe, could lay down their 
lives bearing witness to the truth of that. . . . 
If my calling be from God, and my testimony 
from the People — God and the People shall 
take it from me." At the end of the wars, he 
told them, he had hoped to return to private 
life: "I begged to be dismissed of my charge; 
I begged it again and again — and God be the 
Judge between me and all men if I lie in this 
matter." After the dissolution of the Little 
Parliament he had had unlimited power. When 
the Council of State framed a constitution, 
he was told that unless he would undertake the 
Government there would be no settlement. 
He had not received anything which put him 
into a higher capacity than before; but his 
power was limited and he could not act without 
the consent of a Council. Was not their very 
presence in the House of Commons, brought 
thither by Writs directed to the several Sheriffs, 
a proof that they had accepted the Instrument 
of Government? "It was understood that I 

171 



Oliver Cromwell 

was the Protector and the authority that called 
you. That I was in the possession of the 
Government by a right from God and man." 

He then went on to insist on four funda- 
mentals which the members must accept: the 
Government was to be by a single Person and 
a Parliament; Parliaments were not to make 
themselves perpetual; liberty of conscience 
should be respected: the Protector and Parlia- 
ment were to have joint power over the militia. 

Only such as would sign the parchment 
containing these stipulations might re-enter the 
House. One hundred members signed in an 
hour — three hundred in all. Bradshaw, Hasel- 
rig and other Republicans refused. 

The Purge did not make much difference 
and Parliament continued discussions which 
were contrary to the agreement. After bearing 
with it for the requisite five months the Protector, 
dismissed it on January 23, 1655. 

For the next eighteen months the country 
was under military law and Cromwell was a 
despot. His difficulties were great. As he 
wrote to Fleetwood: "The wretched jealousies 
that are amongst us, and the spirit of calumny 
turn all into gall and wormwood." 

England was divided into ten districts, 
and over each of these was set a Major-General, 
who had to keep order, shut down alehouses, 

172 



Healing and Settling 

see that Sunday was observed in the very letter 
of the law, repress Levellers and other enemies 
of the Commonwealth, control the local militia, 
and levy heavy burdens on the Royalists for 
its upkeep. 

Little wonder that plots against the Protec- 
tor's life were rife, that Royalist hopes were 
high! Cromwell kept himself well informed, 
and his knowledge of conspiracies at home and 
abroad was almost uncanny. Scattered Roya- 
list risings took place in England, and one 
under Penruddock gave a good deal of trouble, 
but it was finally crushed, the leader was 
apprehended, and with fourteen of his followers 
he paid forfeit with his life. 

Other more innocent persons suffered a worse 
fate. The Quaker movement was in its infancy, 
and one, James Nayler, at the head of a body 
of eight men and women, singing as they rode 
through Bristol town, "Holy, Holy, Holy, Lord 
God of Sabaoth," was arrested by the local 
Major-General and sent on trial to London. 
Here he was sentenced, as a blasphemer, "To 
stand in the pillory two hours at Westminster, 
to be whipped by the hangman through the 
streets from Westminster to the Old Exchange, 
and there to stand in the pillory two hours more, 
and that his tongue be bored through with a hot 
iron, and that he be stigmatized in the forehead 

i73 



Oliver Cromwell 

with the letter B." As if this were not sufficient 
penalty even for the most extravagant opinions, 
he was to be returned to Bristol, there to be 
compelled to ride through the city, with his 
face to the horse's tail, and publicly whipped at 
the Market Place. When all these barbarities 
had been executed he was to be returned to 
London and imprisoned at Bridewell. 

Nayler was a foolish extremist, but all 
the early Quakers suffered persecution. Their 
founder, George Fox, when he had been seized 
by the soldiers, appealed to the Protector. 
He has recorded in his Diary how he had much 
discourse with Cromwell and explained to him 
what he and the Friends — as the members of 
the new sect were called — had been led to think 
concerning Christ and his apostles. "That is 
very good; that is true," agreed the Protector. 
"Other persons coming in, persons of quality 
so called, I drew back; lingered; and then was 
for retiring: he caught me by the hand and 
with moist beaming eyes said: 'Come again 
to my house! If thou and I were but an hour 
a day together we should be nearer one to the 
other. I wish no more harm to thee than I 
do to my own soul.' " 



174 



CHAPTER XIX: Will he be 
King? 

FOR eighteen months military rule con- 
tinued under the Protector, the Council 
of State, and the hated Major-Generals. 
At the end of that time the Protector, face to 
face with Charles I's perpetual difficulty of 
finding money for home and foreign expenses, 
determined to summon another Parliament. 

Great excitement prevailed in the country over 
the elections. Many men felt the call to become 
candidates, but few were chosen unless they 
could first of all satisfy the Major- Generals as 
to their principles and practices. The Major- 
Generals themselves were all returned. Many 
electors abstained from voting, holding that it 
mattered little who was chosen, since the 
Protector would have his own way in any case, 
and if opposed he would call in the military to 
turn out offenders. 

Cromwell, as his custom was, addressed the 
newly elected representatives in the Painted 
Chamber before they actually met in the House. 
In a lengthy and somewhat involved and dis- 
cursive speech on the condition of the country 
he hotly defended the appointment of the 
Major-Generals: "I think if ever anything 

i75 



Oliver Cromwell 

were justifiable as to necessity, and honest in 
every respect, this was." Three months later, 
however, he had to bow to Parliamentary will 
and allow them to be dismissed. 

A surprise was in store for the members when 
they left the Painted Chamber. Before enter- 
ing the House each one had to produce a 
certificate that he was approved by "His 
Highness's council," and those without this 
passport were denied admission. In this way 
over a hundred members were excluded, not 
only to their own bitter resentment — for 
their appeal to be admitted was disregarded — 
but to the indignation of the whole House. 
The Protector could not, even with all the 
precautions that had been taken, face a free 
Parliament. 

And yet he could not manage it. This 
assembly was to be no exception to the rule 
that he could not get on with Parliaments: 
he had neither the necessary tact nor the 
constitutional sense, since he had gradually 
come to believe that necessity knew no law. 
This second Parliament of the Protectorate 
was bent on having the Government of the 
country on a legal and constitutional basis. 
Curiously enough, this led to a widely accepted 
demand that Cromwell should take the title 
of King. A malcontent, Miles Sindercombe, 

176 



Will he be King? 

attempted the Protector's life by setting light to 
Whitehall Chapel, hoping to shoot him in the 
ensuing confusion, but was foiled in his attempt. 
The vote of congratulation passed by Parliament 
was amended by one member moving that "it 
would tend very much to the preservation of 
himself and us that His Highness would be 
pleased to take upon him the government 
according to the ancient constitution." 

On February 23, 1656, an amended Instrument 
of Government was brought before the House. 
It offered the Protector the title of King and 
authorized the formation of a Second Chamber 
to replace the former House of Lords. This 
scheme was known as "The Humble Petition 
and Advice." After a month's consultation and 
negotiations between the Protector and Parlia- 
ment, Speaker Lenthall, accompanied by mem- 
bers of the House, repaired to the Banqueting 
Hall at Whitehall and formally presented it to 
the Protector. Cromwell was in a difficult 
situation: if he accepted the title he would 
placate the majority in Parliament, but offend 
the army by which he had risen to power. He 
told them that he must have leisure to consider 
the matter. "I have lived the latter part of 
my age in — if I may say so — the fire; in the 
midst of troubles. But all the things that have 
befallen me since I was first engaged in the 

177 



Oliver Cromwell 

affairs of this Commonwealth, if they could be 
supposed to be all brought into such a compass 
that I could take a view of them at once, truly 
I do not think they would 'so move/ nor do I 
think they ought so to move my heart and spirit 
with that fear and reverence of God that be- 
comes a Christian, as the thing that hath now 
been offered by you to me." 

For three days of anxious thought and 
deliberation Cromwell considered the proposal. 
He summoned the House to hear his decision. 
The two aims of his life, he said, had been 
civil and religious liberty: "Upon these two 
interests, if God shall account me worthy I 
shall live and die. And I must say if I were to 
give an account before a greater tribunal than 
an earthly one; if I were asked why I have 
engaged all along in the late war, I could give 
no answer that were not a wicked one if I did 
not comprehend these two ends." He was 
grateful for their offer, but it was not fitting for 
him to accept it. 

The matter did not end here. Parliament 
would not take "no" for an answer, and further 
negotiations took place. The Protector con- 
ferred with his leading counsellors, and for hours 
they were shut up together in private discourse. 
Even in these weighty conferences there were 
lighter moments, and sometimes the boisterous 

178 



Will he be King? 

moods of his earlier manhood would return 
upon him and he would be very cheerful. 
"And laying aside his greatness he would be 
exceedingly familiar; and by way of diversion 
would make verses with them, play crambo 
with them, and every one must try his fancy. 
He commonly called for tobacco-pipes and a 
candle and would now and then take tobacco 
himself." 

The leaders of the army made their position 
plain and signified that they would lay down 
their commands if Cromwell were King. Seven 
and twenty officers, with Pride at their head, 
presented a petition to Parliament against any 
revival of the monarchy. 

A compromise was finally reached. The 
Protector accepted "The Humble Petition and 
Advice," by which a Second Chamber was to 
be created, with members chosen by himself, 
to sit for life. He accepted the authority to 
nominate his successor, but he refused the 
title of King. 

In order to emphasize the fact that Cromwell 
was now appointed by Parliament to the head- 
ship of the state a second installation took place, 
this time at Westminster Hall, with all but 
royal ceremonial. His Highness sat under a 
canopy of state on the Coronation Chair, which 
had been brought from the Abbey. Speaker 

179 



Oliver Cromwell 

Lenthall came forward and in the name of Par- 
liament presented him with a robe of purple 
velvet, lined with ermine, which was placed 
upon his shoulders. The Speaker then de- 
livered to him the symbols of his office — a 
richly gilt and embossed Bible, a sceptre of 
massive gold, and a sword. The oath was ad- 
ministered to him, and prayer was offered up 
for God's blessing on Protector and People. 

This was Cromwell's hour. As he sat 
enthroned, the sceptre in his hand, foreign 
ambassadors on either side, the great digni- 
taries of the land standing in his presence, 
and heard the blare of trumpets and the shouts 
of the populace, he had reached the summit of 
human glory. Not by divine right, nor by 
the right of sword, but by the right conferred 
on him by Parliament, he was the uncrowned 
King of England! 

This great man who had wielded so much 
power was now beginning to show signs of the 
arduous life he had led, and he was often ill 
with a return of the feverish complaint that 
he had suffered from in Scotland and Ireland. 
With the reopening of Parliament six months 
later his troubles began again, for it was 
evident that no real settlement had been 
effected. "The Other House" (as the Second 
Chamber was called) and the House of Commons 

1 80 




CROMWELL READING TO HIS FAMILY 



Will he be King? 

were soon at loggerheads. To the disgust of 
the ultra-Republicans, Cromwell had conferred 
on the Second Chamber the title of Lords. 
There was also some doubt as to the extent of 
their duties: were they to have power to make 
laws or were they only to advise on them? 

The Protector well knew that the incessant 
disputes were but fuel to the fire of the growing 
Royalist agitation. He went down to the 
House, wrought up with anger, to insist that 
they should now stand by the new constitution. 
Once more in the bitterness of his heart he 
bade them remember: "I sought not this 
place. I speak it before God, Angels and 
Men: I Did Not. You sought me for it, 
you brought me to it, and I took my oath to 
be faithful to the interest of these nations, 
to be faithful to the Government." 

No reconciliation seemed possible. Ten days 
later Cromwell, accompanied by a military 
guard, rode in his coach to Westminster, 
summoned both houses before him and in 
words of stinging rebuke dissolved Parliament. 
"And let God be the judge between you and 
me," was his parting shot. 



181 



CHAPTER XX: Foreign Policy 

HE once more joined us to the conti- 
nent — sang the poet Marvell of Crom- 
well's achievements abroad. Even 
Clarendon was able to say that his greatness 
at home was eclipsed by his greatness abroad. 

The Protector had a threefold aim in his 
relation with foreign states: to spread Protes- 
tantism, forming if possible an alliance of all 
Protestant Powers; to extend English com- 
merce; to prevent the restoration of the Stuarts 
by foreign interference. 

The Dutch War, instituted largely for com- 
mercial purposes, has already been mentioned, 
as has Cromwell's disapproval of it. In the first 
Parliament of his Protectorate he was able to 
announce peace with the Dutch, and England's 
supremacy at sea was established. This was 
followed by treaties signed with the northern 
Protestant states of Sweden and Denmark. 
And, over and above this, a commercial treaty 
was concluded with Catholic Portugal, allowing 
England to trade with her colonies. 

For a time the Commonwealth was on good 
terms with Spain and an alliance between 
the two countries was discussed. The Pro- 
tector's terms, however, were unreasonable, 

182 



Foreign Policy 

for not only did he demand the right to trade 
with the Spanish-American colonies, but he 
desired the assurance that English residents in 
Spain should be allowed to worship as they 
pleased. The demands were rejected, and war 
with Spain followed. In 1655 Admiral Penn 
and General Venables, with a fleet of thirty- 
eight ships, were sent out to the West Indies 
with the object of taking Hispaniola (Haiti). 
They sailed to the island and attempted to take 
the capital of San Domingo, but disastrously 
failed. The expedition was ill-equipped and ill- 
managed, and the soldiers suffered terribly from 
thirst and bad food. English prestige was par- 
tially restored by the capture of Jamaica. 

Blake's glory was not dimmed by this cam- 
paign, for he had been previously sent out, 
under secret orders, to the Mediterranean, to 
avenge injuries to English commerce or insults 
to the English flag. He successfully bom- 
barded Tunis and destroyed the fortifications. 
When the war with Spain broke out he hovered 
round the Spanish coast to attempt the capture 
of her treasure-ships. His most brilliant exploit 
was at Santa Cruz, off Teneriffe, where he 
captured the entire Spanish Plate fleet without 
losing one of his own ships. It was also his 
last exploit, for on the journey home he was 
stricken with a mortal illness. His prayer to 

183 



Oliver Cromwell 

stand once more on English soil was unanswered, 
for he died within sight of Plymouth Sound 
on August 7, 1657. 

Laden with spoil of the South, fulfilled with the glory 
of achievement, 
And freshly crowned with never dying fame, 
Sweeping by shores where the names are the names of 
the victories of England, 
Across the Bay the squadron homeward came. 

There lay the Sound and the Island with green leaves 
down beside the water, 
The town, the Hoe, the masts, with sunset fired — 
Dreams! ay dreams of the dead! for the great heart 
faltered on the threshold, 
And darkness took the land his soul desired. 1 

Spain, as we have seen, had failed to secure 
the friendship of the Commonwealth, but 
France, then swayed by the astute Italian, 
Cardinal Mazarin, who had kept a watchful 
eye on the rise of Cromwell, was more fortunate. 
Spain was a declining Power: France, as a 
result of the Thirty Years War, in which many 
of the continental nations had been embroiled, 
was growing in wealth and power. 

While Cromwell was debating in his mind 

the most profitable course to take, England and 

all Protestant Europe rang with horror at the 

news of the persecution of the Vaudois peasantry. 

1 Henry Newbolt, The Death of Admiral Blake, by 
permission of the author. 

184 



Foreign Policy 

These inoffensive villagers, Protestant to the 
core, failing to be converted to Catholicism by 
the command of the Duke of Savoy, were 
ruthlessly expelled from their homes, and if 
they showed any resistance were massacred. 

Cromwell's noble and generous spirit was 
roused to the utmost by this atrocity. He 
received the news with tears. Immediately he 
headed a subscription-list for the sufferers with 
a magnificent donation of £2000, and ordered 
a day of humiliation and prayer, with house-to- 
house collections on behalf of the victims. Their 
cause was pleaded in sober letters to Protestant 
states and in passionate verse by Milton: 

Avenge, O Lord, thy slaughtered saints, whose bones 

Lie scattered on the Alpine mountains cold; 

Even them who kept Thy Truth so pure of old, 
When all our fathers worshipped stocks and stones, 
Forget not: in Thy Book record their groans 

Who were Thy sheep, and in their ancient fold 

Slain by the bloody Piemontese that rolled 
Mother with infant down the rocks. Their moans 
The vales redoubled to the hills, and they 

To Heav'n. Their martyred blood and ashes sow 
O'er all th' Italian fields, where still doth sway 

The triple tyrant: that from these may grow 
A hundredfold, who, having learnt Thy Way, 

Early may fly the Babylonian woe. 

Cromwell made his understanding with France, 
then at war with Spain, dependent on her willing- 

185 



Oliver Cromwell 

ness to redress this cruel wrong and compel the 
Duke of Savoy to cease from persecution. 

Mazarin consented, and Cromwell signed the 
Treaty of Paris on March 23, 1657. In it he 
agreed to help France against Spain in the 
Netherlands, and to send 6000 men and vessels 
of the fleet to assist in the capture of Gravelines. 
The French General Turenne remarked on the 
fine quality of Cromwell's Ironsides, veterans 
who had seen long service — there were none 
finer in Europe, he declared. 

As a reward for her successful assistance 
England gained a footing on the Continent in 
the cession of Mardyke and Dunkirk. The 
young Louis XIV sent an embassy to Crom- 
well, bearing the royal gift of a magnificent 
jewelled sword. All was well abroad except for 
the fear of Spain's assistance in the restoration of 
the Stuarts. But the cost of the war and other 
financial difficulties pressed heavily at home. 



186 



CHAPTER XXI: Death of 

Cromwell 

WITH the dismissal of the second Par- 
liament of the Protectorate the end, 
though none suspected it, was in 
sight. For the last thirty years — he was now 
fifty-eight — Cromwell's life had been devoted to 
the public weal, to political and religious freedom. 
He had lived, he had worked, he had suffered, 
he had made mistakes — and small wonder that 
at times he yearned to "have lived under my 
woodside, to have kept a flock of sheep." 
Retirement, however, was not for him, but 
his desire to be at rest was approaching its 
fulfilment. As a soldier he had stood the 
rigours of many campaigns and had often been 
ill. As a politician he had stood the mental 
strain of many a fight to preserve the Common- 
wealth. It was time to lay down his arms. 
The iron hand was beginning to lose its grip, 
the iron will could not triumph over physical 
infirmities for ever. "I look upon this to be 
the great duty of my place," he had said to the 
two Houses of Parliament; "as being set on 
a watch-tower to see what may be for the good of 
these nations." He was now to be relieved of 
his post. 

187 



Oliver Cromwell 

If the affairs of state were difficult and 
troublesome his own private affairs were tragic. 
His youngest daughter, Frances Cromwell, had 
recently lost her husband, Robert Rich, after 
four months of marriage; his well-loved daughter, 
Elizabeth Claypole, was bereft of one of her 
sons and now herself lay dying at Hampton 
Court. "She had great sufferings, great exer- 
cises of spirit," and her father's heart was wrung 
at the sight of her distress. On August 6 she 
died. Cromwell fell ill a few days later and 
was confined to his room. Once before, when 
he was mourning for his boy, he had turned, 
as he did now, to St Paul's Epistle to the 
Philippians to read, "I can do all things through 
Christ which strengthened me." 

"This Scripture did once save my life," he 
said, "when my eldest son died, which went 
as a dagger to my heart, indeed it did." 

A low fever seized him and it turned to 
ague, but he still continued to attend to the 
affairs of state and to transact necessary 
business. On August 20 George Fox went to 
Hampton Court to plead with him once more 
for the sufferings of the Friends, and met the 
Protector riding in the Park. "I saw and 
felt a waft of death go forth against him, and 
when I came to him he looked like a dead man," 
he wrote in his Diary. 

188 



Death of Cromwell 

The news of Cromwell's illness spread through- 
out the country and fervent prayers went up 
for his recovery. He himself confidently hoped 
that God, "who was far above nature," would 
restore him to health. He rallied a little and 
the physicians ordered his removal to White- 
hall — his last journey. He grew gradually 
worse, but his mind, clear as ever, was possessed 
with the thought of God's dealings with the 
human soul. "Is it possible to fall from 
grace?" he asked a minister in attendance. 
He was reassured. "Then I am safe, for I know 
that I was once in grace." His wife and 
children stood weeping round him and he spoke 
words of counsel. "Love not the world. I say 
unto you it is no good that you should love the 
world." 

On August 30 a terrible storm broke over the 
country — prophetic to some of the Protector's 
coming doom, to others of the release of a 
mighty soul. He was asked to name a suc- 
cessor and murmured: "Richard." Whether 
Richard's name was the one he had written in 
that sealed paper which could never be found 
at Hampton Court, none ever knew. 

In his dying hour Cromwell prayed for the 
nation: "And I may, I will, come to Thee, for 
Thy people. Thou hast made me, though very 
unworthy, a mean instrument to do them some 



Oliver Cromwell 

good, and Thee service; and many of them 
have set too high a value upon me, though 
others wish and would be glad of my death; 
Lord, however Thou do dispose of me, continue 
and go on to do good for them. Give them 
consistency of judgment, one heart, and mutual 
love; and go on to deliver them, and with 
the work of reformation, and make the name 
of Christ glorious in the world. Teach those 
who look too much upon Thy instruments to 
depend more upon Thyself. Pardon such as 
desire to trample on the dust of a poor worm 
for they are Thy people too. And pardon the 
folly of this short prayer — even for Jesus 
Christ's sake. And give us a good night if 
it be Thy pleasure." 

On September 2 he spoke again of what was 
nearest to his heart: "I would be willing to 
live to be further serviceable to God and His 
people: but my work is done." After a rest- 
less night he was urged to take some nourish- 
ment. "It is not my design to drink or sleep; 
but my design is to make what haste I can to 
be gone." 

The sun rose on September 3, that fateful 
day of two gallant fights. It was evident to 
those about him that the "one fight more, the 
best and the last," was all but over. At four 
in the afternoon he lay dead. 

190 



CHAPTER XXII: Epilogue 

FOR nearly two centuries Cromwell's 
name and fame were to suffer detrac- 
tion, then Carlyle was to come forward 
and proclaim him with trumpet-blast a man 
of truth, the hero as King. "A brave bad 
man," a hypocrite and fanatic — so he was 
judged by those whose vision was clouded by 
the passions of the time. The verdict of 
posterity has been otherwise. The courage 
and character which he demanded of his fight- 
ing men were in him. His inalienable belief in 
God's direct intervention in human affairs was 
as rooted as Joan of Arc's. 

As a soldier Cromwell ranks with the greatest; 
he was a general of genius, and he never suffered 
defeat. As a statesman he does not hold so 
high a place. He was without political fore- 
sight, an opportunist who solved the difficult 
problems of the age as they arose, and hence 
laid himself open to a charge of inconsistency. 
The work he aspired to do, and in some measure 
accomplished, was largely undone by the Restora- 
tion. Yet he had shaped the destinies of a 
people. 

His private life was without reproach. His 
tender love for wife and children is evident at 
every turn. 

191 



Oliver Cromwell 

Would he, if the shadows of death had not 
been gathering round hhn, have named Richard 
as his successor? What hope could there have 
been that such a weakling could uphold the 
Commonwealth ? 

The sequel is soon told. Parliament and the 
army once more strove for mastery and Richard 
was but a cat's-paw between them. After a 
few months of nominal power he dissolved 
Parliament, and his rule was over. 

The time was ripe for Restoration, and the 
following year, on May 29, 1660, Charles II 
entered London in triumph. The reign of the 
Puritans was at an end. 

On the twelfth anniversary of the execution of 
Charles I the Royalists, baulked of their revenge 
on the living, settled their accounts with the 
dead. The bodies of Cromwell, Bradshaw, and 
Ireton were taken from their graves and drawn 
on sledges through Holburn to Tyburn. There 
they hung upon the gallows till sunset, when 
they were cut down and beheaded, the bodies 
flung into the pit beneath, the heads fixed on 
poles and set on Westminster Hall for all to see. 

Beneath the j city's street Cromwell's body 
lies with the roar of mighty London ever 
booming cVerhead. 



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